Journalists wary of travelling to US due to Palantir surveillance

Government surveillance used to police speech and protests

• Many see the case as crossing a bright line: using state surveillance to punish someone for nonviolent political speech (writing about a student protest), under a “combating antisemitism” pretext.
• Commenters emphasize the First Amendment constrains government, not private actors: social or commercial consequences of speech are one thing; state detention, device search, and deportation are another.
• Several share border‑control anecdotes (phone searches, email/spam scrutiny, multi‑day detentions), framing this as part of a longstanding but increasingly normalized pattern.

Palantir, tech work, and personal ethics

• Some engineers refuse Palantir‑adjacent jobs because they believe the work directly contributes to harm and creeping authoritarianism.
• Others push back, asking how one determines “harm” for non‑analyst roles, or suggests joining to act as a whistleblower—met with concern about becoming institutionalized and rationalizing abuses.

Law enforcement staffing and ideology

• A strand argues that demonizing jobs like police, military, prison guards, etc., has driven away people with civil‑liberties concerns, leaving these institutions skewed toward more authoritarian personalities.
• Counterpoint: people prefer to denounce institutions on social media rather than “do the hard work from the inside.”

Surveillance infrastructure and license plate readers

• One commenter runs a thought experiment: if mass license‑plate surveillance is inevitable, should the data be public and open‑source rather than in private hands?
• Others answer that “opening it up” just broadens abuse (stalking, burglary) and doesn’t solve the power‑imbalance problem; they recount ALPR vendors bragging about feeding comprehensive tracking data directly to police with little real privacy thinking.

Thiel, Palantir, and “the West”

• Some liken the Tolkien‑themed branding to embracing the role of the villain while claiming to “save Western civilization.”
• One side argues it’s better that Western actors wield these tools than authoritarian rivals like Russia, China, or Iran; critics call this a false choice that normalizes domestic repression and ignores Western‑backed abuses abroad.

Continuity vs escalation since the Patriot Act

• Veterans of intelligence work insist the technical capabilities (global selectors, Palantir‑backed fusion of signals and OSINT) have existed and been publicly discussed for more than a decade.
• Others respond that what’s new is the overt, political use of these tools to target people who “have done nothing wrong” beyond expressing disfavored views, and that this reflects a broader erosion of norms.

US, Europe, and speech at the border

• Some note parallels to European states that bar speakers or deport pro‑Palestine activists, arguing the US is now “responsibly moderating” speech like Europe.
• Others maintain the US government should “blindly” follow the First Amendment and, if necessary, formally amend it rather than erode it through practice.

Skepticism about the specific story

• A minority find aspects of the account implausible or melodramatic and question why this source should be trusted over “any random internet crank.”
• Others counter that multi‑day detentions and harsh CBP practices are well‑documented, and that reflexive disbelief itself illustrates how denial has enabled these systems to grow.

Meta: titles, labels, and OSINT

• Some complain the HN title is overstated (“journalists” plural) and that the subject may be more blogger than journalist; others argue the title actually understates the seriousness (deportation for speech).
• One commenter notes that deleting posts obviously doesn’t erase them from institutional archives or commercial OSINT tools; attributing everything specifically to Palantir may be speculative, but the underlying tracking is not.