Donald Trump’s great big ugly surveillance state

It’s been a busy six months for Donald Trump and his great big ugly surveillance state, and even though he and his Republican Party buddies will deny its existence, its Orwellian power continues to grow under the guise of “immigration and border control.”

Trump really kicked things up a notch back in March with his “Eliminating Information Silos” executive order (via RonPaulInstitute.org):

On March 20, President Trump signed an executive order “Eliminating Information Silos.” The order directed heads of federal agencies to make sure officials designated by the president “have full and prompt access to all unclassified agency records, data, software systems, and information technology systems.” The executive order did not attract much attention until it was more recently revealed that the administration was working with tech company Palantir to create a database containing all information collected by all federal agencies on all U.S. citizens.

A database consisting of all the information of American citizens collected by the various federal agencies such as the Social Security Administration, the Department of Health and Human Services, and the Pentagon would be a major step in creating a total surveillance state. This database could come in handy to future Dr. Faucis seeking to enforce mask and vaccine mandates. Those with access to this database could see personal health records, education records, and tax returns. They may even be able to see how many firearms individuals have purchased and if they were associated with any organizations the government had labeled “extremist.”

Despite the obvious threat to liberty the “big ugly database” poses, some commentators and “influencers” who would normally oppose, or at least be skeptical of, expansion of the surveillance state are supporting it because they believe it will be used to locate illegal immigrants. Some conservatives are supporting this proposal because it will help identify students who have publicly opposed the U.S. government’s support for Israel’s actions in Gaza. Ironically, many of those supporting government cracking down on “anti-Israel” students came to fame (and in some cases fortune) as critics of “wokeness” and cancel culture.

The abandonment of liberty because fear drives people to trust government promises of safety is a phenomenon we have witnessed several times this century. An obvious example is the way many former friends of freedom supported the PATRIOT Act and other infringements on liberty following the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. We also saw it during the covid hysteria when many embraced mask and vaccine mandates. Following the 2008 market meltdown, normally rather staunch opponents of government intervention supported the bailouts because they agreed with then-President George W. Bush who said he had “abandoned free-market principles to save the free-market system.”

Palantir, founded in 2003, has worked on helping government become more efficient at collecting and storing information about US citizens. The company, which was named after the seeing stones from J.R.R. Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings, is one of the first companies to see the potential in the surveillance-industrial complex that developed following 9-11 and the PATRIOT Act. Palantir is literally the creation of the surveillance state since one of its early investors was In-Q-Tel, a venture capital firm controlled by the CIA.

Those discouraged by the surveillance state’s continued expansion under President Trump should be encouraged that more Americans than ever, including many who voted for President Trump, are seeing through the lie that the only way we can be safe is to surrender our liberty to politicians, bureaucrats, and crony capitalism. This should inspire us to redouble our efforts to spread the message of liberty. (Emphasis mine)

As I predicted in a May 2025 article, Donald Trump is using the border security issue to expand government’s mass surveillance capabilities and ultimately give Big Brother what it needs to track anyone and everyone it chooses. This is when US Customs and Border Protection (CBP) agents started accepting bids from tech companies for real-time facial recognition technology capable of capturing everyone in a vehicle, and not just those sitting in the front seats (via Wired.com):

United States Customs and Border Protection is asking tech companies to send pitches for a real-time face recognition tool that would take photos of every single person in a vehicle at a border crossing, including anyone in the back seats, and match them to travel documents, according to a document posted in a federal register last week.

The request for information, or RIF, says that CBP already has a face recognition tool that takes a picture of a person at a port of entry and compares it to travel or identity documents that someone gives to a border officer, as well as other photos from those documents already “in government holdings.”

“Biometrically confirmed entries into the United States are added to the traveler’s crossing record,” the document says.

An agency under the Department of Homeland Security, CBP says that its face recognition tool “is currently operating in the air, sea, and land pedestrian environments.” The agency’s goal is to bring it to “the land vehicle environment.” (Emphasis mine)

Biometrically confirmed? Air, sea, and land? That comes directly from Trump’s talking points over the years whenever the issue of immigration and border security came up, going all the way back to his 2016 campaign.

“We will finally complete the Biometric Entry/Exit Visa Tracking System which we need desperately. It will be on land, sea, and air. We will have a proper tracking system.”

Trump and the Republican-controlled Congress at the time attempted to implement a biometric digital ID in 2018 when the House introduced the Securing America’s Future Act of 2018 (H.R.4760), a 400-page monstrosity authored by Rep Bob Goodlatte (R-VA). Encompassing everything from education and the workforce to Homeland Security and the military; this so-called immigration bill contained a tiny little detail about biometric identification in the form of a National ID card that would be required for every American.

According to Ron Paul, SAFA would have given government many liberty-killing powers:

• It would have allowed federal bureaucrats to include biometric identification information on the card, potentially even including fingerprints, retinal scans, or scans of veins on the back of hands, which could easily be used as a tracking device.
• It would have been required for all US workers, regardless of place of birth, making it illegal for anyone to hold a job in the US who didn’t obtain an ID card.
• It would have required every employer to purchase an “ID scanner” to verify the ID cards with the federal government, meaning that any time a citizen applied for a job, the government would know.
• They would have ultimately required “ID scans” to make routine purchases, as well.

This ID card had the capacity to be used as a tracking device, and it would have been required to hold a job, open a bank account, or get on a plane.

Thanks to Department of Homeland Security (DHS) program launched in 2005 known as the REAL ID Act, liberty took another step toward tyranny and the creation of a surveillance state — a primary objective of the current Trump administration — giving government the ability to track your every move.

The REAL ID Act requires everyone applying for a driver’s license to provide the DMV with their social security number, proof of legal residence, and two proofs of their home address. Additionally, the REAL ID Act gives DHS the authority to mandate, as it sees fit, the inclusion of additional items to put in the government database, such as various “biometric” identifiers like retina scans, fingerprints, and DNA.

How long will it be until Trump’s biometric ID cards are required by government to make routine purchases? Before you answer that question, consider this: Trump’s GENIUS Act ultimately gives government that very power.

And let’s not forget success government had when other forms of digital IDs were created during the previous “crisis” known as COVID-19. Current and former officials around the globe believe that COVID created the perfect timing for a digital ID card program as the solution to dealing with the lockdowns and social distancing laws during the so-called pandemic.

The technology being developed and used to address border security will make it easier for government to expand the big ugly surveillance state and track our every move; creating a society where liberty can be destroyed at the push of a button. It begins by declaring a “national emergency” at the border, and it ends with facial recognition, martial law, and a government that holds full control over everyone.

 

---

David Leach is the owner of the Strident Conservative. He holds people of every political stripe accountable for their failure to uphold conservative values, and he promotes those values instead of political parties. He the author of The New Axis of Evil: Exposing the Bipartisan War on Liberty.

Follow the Strident Conservative on Twitter and Facebook.

Subscribe to receive podcasts of his daily radio feature: iTunes | Pandora | Tune In | iHeart | RSS

For media inquiries or to have David speak to your group, use the Contact Us form.