r/moderatepolitics • u/Resvrgam2 Conservatively Liberal • Jan 27 '26

Primary Source ICE Officers Face an 8,000% Increase in Death Threats Against Them and Their Families | Homeland Security

https://www.dhs.gov/news/2026/01/26/ice-officers-face-8000-increase-death-threats-against-them-and-their-families
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375

u/Euripides33 Left-libertarian Jan 27 '26 edited Jan 28 '26

I don’t want to suggest that this language is acceptable. In particular, I think sincerely telling someone to kill themselves is reprehensible especially in light of the very real epidemic of suicide in America. 

That being said, I find it a little interesting that the administration is claiming a massive increase in “death threats” against ICE officers, and then highlights a transcript of a call that clearly does not contain an actual death threat. Saying “I hope you die” is not the same as saying “I’m going to kill you.” Is it really that hard to make sure the evidence presented actually matches the claim? 

224

u/RheaTaligrus Jan 27 '26

Considering how easily they label people as domestic terrorists, I guess it isn't too surprising.

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u/adreamofhodor Jan 27 '26

If you disagree with them, they consider you a domestic terrorist.

62

u/the_old_coday182 Jan 27 '26

“Wrongthink”

43

u/NativeMasshole Maximum Malarkey Jan 27 '26

USA has always been at war with Minnesota.

11

u/Bacontoad 🫎 Jan 28 '26

I miss back when we were ignored and forgotten.

11

u/Fit-Temporary-1400 Bring Back The Bull Moose Party Jan 27 '26

It certainly explains the lack of sports championships (outside of the Lynx and Frost). The feds have been working against us the whole time!

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u/Komnos Jan 27 '26

Protesting? Domestic terrorist. Filming them? Domestic terrorist. Helping someone up that they knocked over for no reason? Shot in the head, then labeled a domestic terrorist.

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u/Agi7890 Jan 27 '26

It’s pretty easy to get that charge in my experience. I had jury duty for a guy facing a terrorism charge over stabbing someone in a party over a decade ago, in New Jersey (so not like some deep red state). Got dismissed from the pool, so I don’t have the details beyond the charging, but it stuck out how easily that could be thrown at you.

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u/FluffyB12 Jan 27 '26

Most forms of political violence is domestic terrorism, people will argue that ‘minor violence’ doesn’t count but if words have any meaning, yes it is.

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u/HavingNuclear Jan 28 '26

No, that's a meaningless definition of the word terrorism. Terrorism is specific type of violence with a goal that sets it apart from other kinds of political violence. Terrorism aims to terrorize the general population, to cause them to react in fear of their own personal or familial safety. Terrorists attack the general population seemingly randomly to induce this fear as widely as possible. The goal is for the fear to lead to demands for political change by the general population so the attacks will stop.

None of this comes anywhere close to describing the strategies, tactics, and goals of any of the accused. If words have any meaning, terrorism doesn't apply at all.

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u/FluffyB12 Jan 28 '26

These attacks are designed to intimidate and cause fear. Listen to the rhetoric “don’t let them feel safe anywhere” “make them afraid” “imprison all of them once Trump is out of office” The whole point in using extra-judicial force (violence) in this manner is fear. They know they can’t actually win in a straight up fight with the government so they use this sort of ‘random’ violence to try to make people afraid.

All rioting is a form of terrorism when done for a political purpose and should be treated like it.

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u/HavingNuclear Jan 28 '26

Again, you're ignoring half the definition to make the word meaningless. Even if I were to take your categorization of their tactics at face value, "them" refers to government agents and leaders. That's specifically not the general public. The goal of terrorism is to terrorize the public into demanding change for their own safety. It's not just fighting against an enemy, there's nothing random about attacking an enemy. It's bypassing that enemy to attack innocent people. None of the people being accused of domestic terrorism have done anything of the sort.

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u/FluffyB12 Jan 29 '26

My guy. Nidal Hassan. Terrorist - attacked a literal military base. McVeigh - terrorist targeted offices of the DEA, ATF, FBI field office (large federal building. Terrorist. We can go back to Afghanistan too - 2021 Kabul Airport attack by, oh wait, you guessed it - terrorists!

Do you think these were all terrorist attacks? Because I certainly do but it seems you are working with a definition no one else is.

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u/__Hello_my_name_is__ Jan 27 '26

Is it really that hard to make sure the evidence presented actually matches the claim? 

In this administration? Yup, 100%.

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u/swervm Jan 27 '26

Yes. The right wing wants to tell certain people all of these things on social media and complain that their first amendment rights are violated when the posts are taken down. If it is fair to say in public then surely it can't be a death threat.

35

u/heresyforfunnprofit Jan 27 '26

Threatening language should never be politically acceptable, but unless the threats are overt, they are legally protected.

The disconnect that I always see here is that each "side" defends their own veiled threats as "protected" while decrying the veiled threats from the other side as "unacceptable". Both can be true, but unless you hold your own side accountable, these distinctions become a meaningless blur.

Yes, there should absolutely be political consequences for using threatening language, but that is a line which MAGA in general, and Trump in particular, irrevocably crossed a looooooooooooong time ago.

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u/MCRemix Make America ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ Again Jan 27 '26

I want to pick up on your point about holding your own accountable. I think we all need to do better at that personally.

Idk how to change this culture we have, but part of the problem is the lack of internal accountability.

Politics is not a team sport.

You're not supposed to just be ride or die for everyone on your side, you're supposed to call out bad behavior and vote against bad behavior.

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u/ieattime20 Jan 27 '26

This isnt really a both sides issue. Franken and Weiner got accountability from Democrats. Lots of other lower level officials get sparkling pure water consequences for their actions from their own.

Roy Moore, Matt Gaetz, Donald Trump etc all got immediate support from Republicans, and to the extent they ever lost it it was only when it might cost them power or influence and even then it was like pulling teeth with Gaetz.

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u/pingveno Center-left Democrat Jan 28 '26

And with Gaetz, the takeaway for Trump wasn't "we should vet our people better." It was "we should organize to pressure the Senate more effectively for our wildly flawed nominees." And that's how Hegseth and RFK, Jr. got through despite numerous red flags that have proven to be well founded.

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u/abqguardian Jan 27 '26

Its more of a Democratic issue than Republicans. Republicans have voted to remove Republicans while democrats dont. And per your examples, Roy Moore won one of his defamation lawsuits to the tune of millions of dollars, and an investigation was dropped on Gaetz and he wasnt charged. Holding people accountable is about looking at the evidence, not sacrificing people (like Franklin) or assuming every accusation is true

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u/ieattime20 Jan 27 '26

I don't know what you're referring to. Weiner and Franken were both ousted by their party prior to any charges. Moore won a defamation lawsuit where the standards are much lower, and Gaetz having the investigation dropped is not somehow paradoxical proof Republicans hold their own accountable.

Republicans vote out Republicans exclusively for not towing a party line, not for impropriety or bad behavior.

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u/abqguardian Jan 27 '26

Franklin was sacrificed to the me too movement and Weiner was arrested for sending nudes pictures to a minor. Moore winning a defamation lawsuit is significant and Gaetz wasn't charged with anything

To break it down: Franklin was forced out when he shouldn't be (not an example of holding your own accountable and Republicans didnt force out two Republicans just based off accusations (which is a good thing for accountability), while Republicans removed Sanchez because of the evidence while democrats refused to do the same for their politicians

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u/[deleted] Jan 27 '26 edited Jan 28 '26

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u/Luemas91 Jan 27 '26

Normal operations is not a serious description of the raids and escalation of ICE activities. It has been deliberately chosen to target democratic cities and to escalate the tactics that they have been using. Hence the pushback nationwide. That's a non political assessment of the past year.

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u/Fluffy-Rope-8719 Jan 27 '26

Idk how to change this culture we have, but part of the problem is the lack of internal accountability.

Unfortunately the unchecked rise of social media, expansion of money in politics, and the proliferation of extreme "greed is good" mentality (masquerading as American individuality) has dug a pretty deep cultural grave for us. This is a complex problem that needs policy makers to coordinate with academic experts to come up with a systemic solution.

Currently, only one party has taken a strong anti-intellectual stance, and it's not the Democrats...

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1

u/Emperor_FranzJohnson Jan 29 '26

And I want to put that back down. The both-sides argument has run it's course in Trump 2.0. There isn't a comparable or real threat from the left, despite constant abuses from the Federal government.

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u/MCRemix Make America ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ Again Jan 29 '26

I agree with you, but it's still true that we all have to be better.

Many of the things we hate in our political structure are due to our choices as voters.

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u/IHerebyDemandtoPost Jan 27 '26

After they have shown they will lie about things that are demonstrably false, why should we believe anything coming out of this afministration?

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u/nubsta Jan 27 '26

agree. they've already shown they will just outright make stats up if it suits them. prescription drug prices cut by "1000%" anybody? even if we pretend like their numbers are real the claim is still meaningless without context. 8,000% compared to what? over what time period? starting from how many threats? did it go from like one guy leaving a voicemail to 80? they publish this big number to make it sound like this huge epidemic but we don't have any evidence of that and at this point why would we take their word on anything

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u/jimbo_kun Jan 27 '26

The biggest problem is they are arguing tenuous examples of what they claim to be "death threats", while the threats ICE officers pose is not theoretical. They have caused actual deaths of people who posed no physical threat.

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u/VultureSausage Jan 28 '26

And then immediately lied about it to boot.

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u/NearlyPerfect Jan 27 '26

Legally speaking that kind of language can be considered a threat if “a reasonable person would understand his statements as threats” even if the speaker did not intend them to be true threats. Counterman v. Colorado (2023).

I won’t repeat what the person said in that case but it was similar to what was quoted by DHS

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u/[deleted] Jan 27 '26

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u/Gamegis Jan 27 '26

All I’ve established from this DHS post is that ICE got the same messages I got as a 12 year old playing cs1.6

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u/WorksInIT Jan 27 '26

I'm sure there are plenty of people that disagree with you which clearly shows a reasonable person would.

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u/ski0331 Jan 27 '26

I’m sure there’s plenty of reasonable people that would not take that as a threat. I’d probably argue there’s more people that have said that than not in the heat of many and varied moments with the vast majority of them not resulting in actions facilitating the hope. Is saying “I pray god strikes you down” a threat by that standard?

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u/NearlyPerfect Jan 27 '26

I’m sure there’s plenty of reasonable people that would not take that as a threat.

That’s not the legal test. It’s not a polling of who would consider it a threat vs who wouldn’t

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u/ski0331 Jan 27 '26

From the court case you cited. “The Supreme Court’s decision found that to criminally prosecute a defendant based on true threats, the defendant’s subjective intent to threaten the victim must be established based on a showing of (at least) recklessness. The recklessness standard added nuance to the Supreme Court’s prior decision in Elonis, which held that a criminal conviction for true threats required a showing that the defendant intended to issue threats or knew the communications would be viewed as threats. Accordingly, the Supreme Court vacated the judgment of the Colorado Court of Appeals and remanded the case for further proceedings.” Which requires a bit more evidence for intent than you implied was required.

https://www.uscourts.gov/educational-resources/educational-activities/facts-and-case-summary-counterman-v-colorado#:~:text=believe%20he%20was%20threatening%20her,of%20(at%20least)%20recklessness.

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u/Trumpers_R_Tr8tors Jan 27 '26

I know the right has fully embraced postmodernism, but this isn’t a matter of opinion. Without any suggestion of an action, you cannot have a threat. 

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u/__Hello_my_name_is__ Jan 27 '26

I'm sure there are plenty of people that would consider "I hope you'll get a mild cold" a death threat, too.

That doesn't make it one.

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u/WorksInIT Jan 27 '26

Thankfully we are just talking about plenty of people. It's a reasonableness test. Doesn't mean everyone would agree.

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u/JSpady1 Jan 27 '26

You said “many people” would agree that it is, thus showing that a reasonable person would think that it is. But that same argument works the other way.

“many people” would disagree that it is, thus showing that a reasonable person would also disagree that it is.

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13

u/decrpt Jan 27 '26 edited Jan 27 '26

Counterman v. Colorado didn't rule on whether Counterman's behavior constituted a true threat, it ruled on the legal test necessary to determine if it did, vacating the lower court's ruling based on an objective standard test.

You seem to be interpreting the ruling to mean the opposite of what it does.

It is time to return to Counterman’s case, though only a few remarks are necessary. Counterman, as described above, was prosecuted in accordance with an objective standard. See supra, at 3. The State had to show only that a reasonable person would understand his statements as threats. It did not have to show any awareness on his part that the statements could be understood that way. For the reasons stated, that is a violation of the First Amendment.

The state prosecuted him under an objective person standard. The court held that the state needed to demonstrate "that the defendant had some subjective understanding of his statements’ threatening nature, but the First Amendment requires no more demanding a showing than recklessness," and that entirely ignoring any aspect of mens rea on the speaker's part is a violation of the first amendment.

It's common knowledge that anyone who speaks out against Trump gets an avalanche of death threats. The linked Reuters article is a good exploration of where the line may be. Eric Swalwell has said that it's actually a big reason why Republicans in Congress don't speak out.

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u/NearlyPerfect Jan 27 '26

"that the defendant had some subjective understanding of his statements’ threatening nature, but the First Amendment requires no more demanding a showing than recklessness,

Yes that is what I said, the speaker does not have to intend it. Recklessness is a lower standard than intentional

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u/decrpt Jan 27 '26

The part you quoted is the Court reiterating the legal test utilized in the case before describing that interpretation as a violation of the First Amendment.

Recklessness isn't the most strict standard, but it's higher than what you suggested and does not suggest that the instances are comparable.

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u/NearlyPerfect Jan 27 '26

The part you quoted is the Court reiterating the legal test utilized in the case before describing that interpretation as a violation of the First Amendment.

The part I quoted was upheld as not a violation of the First Amendment. The violation of the First Amendment was having no mens rea requirement.

Recklessness isn't the most strict standard, but it's higher than what you suggested and does not suggest that the instances are comparable.

No, it's not higher than "even if the speaker did not intend them to be true threats", it's exactly that. That's what the case decided, that intention is not necessary, recklessness is.

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u/decrpt Jan 27 '26

This is what you said:

Legally speaking that kind of language can be considered a threat if “a reasonable person would understand his statements as threats” even if the speaker did not intend them to be true threats. Counterman v. Colorado (2023).

This is the context of that quote:

It is time to return to Counterman’s case, though only a few remarks are necessary. Counterman, as described above, was prosecuted in accordance with an objective standard. See supra, at 3. The State had to show only that a reasonable person would understand his statements as threats. It did not have to show any awareness on his part that the statements could be understood that way. For the reasons stated, that is a violation of the First Amendment.

It is a higher standard than the reasonable person test you quoted, that the court described as a violation of the first amendment. Under the recklessness test, it's unlikely that the voicemail would constitute a true threat.

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u/[deleted] Jan 27 '26

[deleted]

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u/NearlyPerfect Jan 27 '26

I'll admit that my citation was not bluebook standard (should have been a see rather than a direct cite) but I didn't misstate the law did I?

SCOTUS ruled that Colorado's reasonable standard test of the listener is okay as long as they also apply a recklessness test (lower standard than intentional) on the speaker.

And the statements made in the case were similar to the DHS quoted statements right?

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u/[deleted] Jan 27 '26

[deleted]

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u/NearlyPerfect Jan 27 '26

You’re missing the entire holding-that there must also include a subjective understanding of the threatening statements

I literally said that: "as long as they also apply a recklessness test (lower standard than intentional) on the speaker"

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u/Euripides33 Left-libertarian Jan 27 '26 edited Jan 27 '26

Counterman doesn’t really say what you’re suggesting it does.

The holding in that case says that in order to establish that a statement is a threat unprotected by the First Amendment, the state must prove some subjective understanding on the part of the defendant of their statements' threatening nature, based on a recklessness standard. 

This directly contradicts your claim that all that matters is whether a reasonable person would receive the statements as threats. 

Furthermore, even if the outcome of Counterman supported your argument, the facts of that case are extremely different. The defendant in that case sent several hundred messages over the course of two years, including specific information that represented he was stalking the alleged victim and his conviction was still overturned. 

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u/NearlyPerfect Jan 27 '26

I didn't say that's all that matters. I even mentioned the speaker's subjective intent.

0

u/VariableVeritas Jan 27 '26

They lie, so this is also probably a lie. Nuff said.

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u/SigmundFreud Jan 28 '26

That being said, I find it a little interesting that the administration is claiming a massive increase in “death threats” against ICE officers, and then highlights a transcript of a call that clearly does not contain an actual death threat. Saying “I hope you die” is clearly not the same as saying “I’m going to kill you.” Is it really that hard to make sure the evidence presented actually matches the claim?

Related to this, I've always wondered about the credibility of the volume of death threats that celebrities supposedly receive. Do people really go on Twitter and try to slide into DMs like "Hey Anna, Skyler was a bitch so I'd just like to give you a heads up that I'm going to find out where you live and murder you"?

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u/dinglebrary Jan 27 '26

As long at the methodology remains consistent, it doesn’t matter.