Mike German, an ex-FBI agent, said immigration agents hiding their identities ‘highlights the illegitimacy of actions’
Some wear balaclavas. Some wear neck gators, sunglasses and hats. Some wear masks and casual clothes.
Across the country, armed federal immigration officers have increasingly hidden their identities while carrying out immigration raids, arresting protesters and roughing up prominent Democratic critics.
It’s a trend that has sparked alarm among civil rights and law enforcement experts alike.
Mike German, a former FBI agent, said officers’ widespread use of masks was unprecedented in US law enforcement and a sign of a rapidly eroding democracy. “Masking symbolizes the drift of law enforcement away from democratic controls,” he said.
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The challenge today is that their legal job may now require them to do things that are constitutionally questionable and ethically repugnant. So even if they’re good people and upstanding citizens, they may be required to, at any point in their day, to choose between doing the right thing and losing their job.
They only have to choose wrong once to no longer be the “good cop”.
Now, because of the way policing works in the US, it may be possible to have an intrinsically good police department. At least until a state or federal agency rolls into town and demands they do something they wouldn’t otherwise do; then they become complicit.
After all… in any other organized gang, there can be good people, but they’re still going to be found guilty of gang activity due to supporting the others.