By Andrea Widburg
One of the constants about socialist governments, going back to Stalin and Hitler, is that ordinary people become spies against their neighbors. When East Germany fell, and people could finally see files from the Stasi (i.e., secret police), it turned out that almost 200,000 people were currently serving as informers, and everyone was encouraged to spy on family, friends, and neighbors to serve the cause. Biden’s DHS would like to see the same happen in America. A FOIA request revealed that it produced training documents teaching ordinary Americans to report on Americans opposed to Biden’s policies.
This sounds too far-fetched to be believable, but it’s true. The Foundation for Freedom Online reviewed documents that America First Legal obtained from the DHS via a Freedom of Information Act request. It showed that the DHS is planning to train ordinary Americans to intervene when they see “radicalization” among their peers.
At this point, you might think, “Well, having learned about the convert to Islam in Florida who just killed his two roommates for insulting his faith, I’d probably want to know what the signs are that an Islamist is preparing to kill.” Or maybe you’d be worried if someone was speaking longingly of the Bader-Meinhoff gang or the KKK. You might even worry about transgender activists.
However, in Biden’s America, it’s not those people who are the problems. Instead, the problem is you. And that’s not because you have committed violent acts and neither have those who share your beliefs. It’s just that the Biden Administration and the Deep State are worried about “suburban moms” who are pro-life or old friends who believe that the COVID vaccine doesn’t work, masks were a failure, the lockdowns destroyed lives, the border is essentially erased, or any of a number of other “conspiracy theories” that have proven to be true.
Here’s how Mike Benz describes what the DHS documents reveal:
Apparently not content with setting up a Ministry of Truth, an Internet censorship directorate, and even a program for controlling speech in video games, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has devised yet another dystopian program for domestic thought control: pushing citizens to monitor each others’ political beliefs under the guise of “deradicalization.”
So reveal new documents obtained by America First Legal (AFL) under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA).
The FOIA files show DHS’s Office of Terrorism and Violence Prevention (“OTVTP,” now known as “CP3”) using taxpayer dollars in January 2021 to screenwrite an online “Choose Your Own Adventure”-style video series to “deradicalize” friends and family.
DHS’s “radicalization suspects” in the video screenplays are not violent terrorists or extremists. They are typical everyday Americans with typical everyday American opinions.
For example, DHS constructs a detailed profile for “Ann,” a “middle-aged pro-life advocate” — she is a “suburban Mom” surrounded by stock footage of “laundry” and “Minivan” who “has become increasingly more concerned about the welfare of other children:”
Having defined Ann, ostensibly the quintessential good citizen, the DHS walks its new Stasi spies through a variety of scenarios, such as her being heard using the phrase “baby killer” or talking to her hairdresser about her pro-life stance. Armed with information about what this dangerous radical looks like, Stasi trainees are given advice about calling the law on Ann, trying to destroy her at work, or digging deeper into pro-life groups.
It does the same thing for “Courtney,” an old friend, who is a “budding conspiracy theorist.” Her particular conspiracy theory is that the government is connected to child abuse and trafficking. Given the child abuse and trafficking the government is facilitating by opening our border, one can be forgiven for suspecting its motives, but in Courtney’s case, Stasi wannabes are told to monitor her social media activity, contact her ex-husband, or snoop into her life—although there’s a good case to be made here that the DHS, by turning citizens into arms of the state, has made them subject to the Fourth Amendment’s proscriptions against unreasonable searches.
Here are all the documents America First Legal received:
DHS Domestic Terrorism Scen… by FoundationForFreedomOnline
It’s one thing to urge citizens to be vigilant about packages that could be bombs or to be aware of someone sweating, mumbling prayers to himself, and smelling of rosewater at fairs or other crowded venues. It’s another thing entirely for the Department of Homeland Security to define the Democrat party’s political opponents as incipient terrorists.
This means we no longer live in a free, two-party representative democracy. Instead, we live in a budding socialist, totalitarian state, complete with a secret police that deputizes citizen fanatics to engage in unlawful searches for crimes. Just as the Deep State used social media to circumvent both the First and Fourth Amendments, it’s doing the same with a generation of citizen spies.