FBI raids Washington Post reporter's home

Press freedom, sources, and chilling effects

• Many see the raid as a direct attack on public‑interest reporting and a way to unmask and punish over 1,000 federal employee sources, with fears of firings, prosecutions, denaturalizations or worse.
• Others note DOJ claims the reporter isn’t a target and say this looks like a standard leak probe aimed at a contractor, but opponents argue that even if technically legal, raiding a reporter’s home is an extreme, rare step that will intimidate future sources.
• Commenters stress that, in U.S. law, it’s the leakers (federal employees/contractors) who are bound by classified rules, not journalists—so the raid targets someone who likely committed no crime to build a case against others.

Government power, ICE, and “secret police” dynamics

• A large part of the thread focuses on ICE’s evolution from immigration enforcement into what many describe as a de facto political police force: warrantless raids, lying to local police, detention and even killing of U.S. citizens, and deployment against “blue” cities.
• Several link this to broader authoritarian drift: deportations of citizens, masked agents grabbing protesters, and courts and Congress failing to check executive power. Some argue this is the predictable culmination of decades of “imperial presidency.”

Tech, surveillance, and device access

• Strong claims appear that U.S. agencies effectively have “root” into Apple/Google ecosystems and can push targeted updates; others push back, pointing out the lack of public proof and past fights over iPhone access.
• End‑to‑end encryption is called out as hollow when corporations control the endpoints.

Law, leaks, and double standards

• Multiple comparisons are drawn: Pentagon Papers vs. today; Snowden vs. incremental internal whistleblowing; Assange and Project Veritas vs. mainstream reporters.
• Some argue the legal framework (espionage laws, search warrants for third parties) allows selective enforcement: “classified” can mean whatever is convenient, creating a tool to harass disfavored journalists while insiders (e.g., presidents with documents at home) evade consequences.

Protest, politics, and resistance

• Commenters debate whether weekend protests and local organizing against ICE shootings indicate a “boiling frog” public or the early stages of serious resistance.
• There’s disagreement over how much politics belongs on a tech forum, but others insist surveillance tech, data markets, and AI tools are now central to repression, so “tech is politics.”
• Long subthreads argue over whether the Second Amendment has any real bite against a modern security state, and why many self‑styled “patriots” cheer state violence while decrying minor speech regulation.