NO MORE AI CAMERAS? Congress Moves to Cut Police Tech Funding
The short version: A video from The Alliance for Secure AI flags Rep. Thomas Massie's plan to strip federal funding from police using Flock and other ALPR systems — a rare bipartisan crack in the surveillance wall.
Our Take
Credit to The Alliance for Secure AI for putting a spotlight on this: Rep. Thomas Massie (R-KY) says he's drafting legislation to cut off federal dollars to police departments and municipalities running Flock Safety cameras and other automated license plate readers. We haven't seen bill text yet, so we're not going to pretend we know the exact mechanics — but the fact that a sitting member of Congress is willing to attack the funding pipeline, rather than just wringing his hands about privacy, is notable.
Most ALPR expansion in this country happens quietly through city council votes, grant money, and vendor sales pitches that never mention retention periods, data sharing with ICE or other agencies, or how easily these networks build a searchable history of everywhere you drive. Cutting federal funding wouldn't kill Flock's business model overnight, but it would force a real public debate about whether taxpayers should be subsidizing a private company's surveillance grid instead of letting it slide through on autopilot.
Whether or not this bill goes anywhere, the pressure has to come from more than one member of Congress. Check our map to see if these cameras are already logging your plate, and hit up take action for ways to push back locally — that's still where most of these fights get won or lost.
This is DeFlock The USA’s original commentary. The video above is the work of The Alliance for Secure AI, published on YouTube — full credit to the creator.