Good Tuesday morning. I’m Tangle’s Executive Editor Isaac Saul, currently juggling a slew of exciting Tangle-related work: This morning, I went on Breaking Points with Saager Enjeti and Krystal Ball to discuss Trump’s border wall coming to the Big Bend region in Texas, where I own property. On Thursday, I’m doing a Reddit AMA while aboard a Greyhound bus to Buffalo, where you can drop in and ask any questions about me or Tangle or national politics. And this Friday, I’m publishing a piece I’ve been working on for weeks on the efficacy of DOGE and what the group actually accomplished (I’m still trying to talk to any former DOGE staffers, and if that’s you, shoot me an email at isaac@readtangle.com or message me on Signal at isaacsaul.15).

But now, I’m diving into the Flock camera debate — a classic case of security vs. privacy, with the added spice of public blowback. We’ve also got a quick look back on what happened on this day, August 18, in 1920. It’s a 14-minute read.

Quick hits.

1. The 60-day deadline for a U.S.–Iran peace agreement set in June expired on Monday. President Donald Trump said the United States is not seeking an extension to the deadline. (The expiration)
2. President Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner met with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to discuss the U.S. peace plan for Gaza, which Israel has rejected. The sides expressed optimism after the talks but did not announce a breakthrough. (The meeting)
3. The trial in a case brought against Meta by a coalition of 29 state attorneys general begins on Tuesday in California. The social media company is accused of illegal practices leading to addictive behavior in teens and children, and could face maximum penalties up to $1.4 trillion if found liable. (The trial) 
4. The House Ethics Committee announced an investigation into Rep. Jimmy Gomez (D-CA) over potential sexual misconduct related to his relationship with a House staffer. (The investigation)
5. Customs and Border Protection Commissioner Rodney Scott said that construction work in Big Bend National Park has been paused while he conducts an in-person review of the building site. (The pause)

Today’s topic.

Flock cameras. In recent weeks, public opposition has grown toward vehicle-tracking cameras used by law enforcement in criminal investigations. Private manufacturer Flock Safety operates the largest network of Automated License Plate Readers (ALPRs) in the United States, with approximately 127,000 cameras across the country. The company has recently faced scrutiny for potential civil liberties violations and misuse by police officers, prompting some localities to review or cancel their contracts with the company. 

Back up: Since 2017, Flock has built camera systems that track vehicle license plates, and the company currently partners with roughly 7,000 police departments and 5,000 private entities. The cameras are placed along roads and in other public areas, using artificial intelligence and infrared technology to interpret license plates. Flock then stores the information (as well as vehicle makes, models, colors, times, and locations) in databases accessible by law enforcement across county and state lines. 

Law enforcement has credited the technology with aiding in high-profile cases, such as the manhunt for the suspect later convicted of attempting to assassinate President Donald Trump in September 2024. It has also been used to catch drug traffickers, identify suspects in violent crimes, locate missing persons, and recover stolen vehicles. 

Critics of ALPRs have accused the networks of enabling police abuse and mass, warrantless surveillance, which has sometimes led to mistaken arrests. Others have objected to state and local agencies that share ALPR data with federal immigration authorities. Investigative reports have also uncovered allegations of misuse by individual officers, such as one who shared an undercover agent’s license plate details with a suspected drug dealer and another who tracked his estranged wife’s movements over 700 times. A Washington Post report published earlier this month found at least 50 officers have been charged with or accused of misusing ALPR systems. 

In response to the public backlash, on August 13, Flock announced a series of changes to its system, including limiting the default amount of time the company retains data from one month to one week and implementing a program to lock out law enforcement officers who perform “abnormal” searches. Civil liberties groups have argued these changes do not address underlying concerns about ALPRs and called on police departments to end their contracts with Flock and companies like it, which some have done. In recent months, individual cameras have also been vandalized or destroyed across the country. 

Today, we’ll have perspectives from the left and right on Flock cameras, followed by Executive Editor Isaac Saul’s take.

In USA Today, Sara Pequeño asked “why are we just watching America become a surveillance state?”

“Since the AI boom, companies have begun selling their surveillance services to anyone who will buy. The most satisfied customer seems to be the U.S. government. Flock, a nationwide camera system for reading license plates powered by artificial intelligence, has recently been in the news for what happens when police officers misuse the technology,” Pequeño wrote. “Faceless corporations aren’t the only ones policing our behavior through mass surveillance. We are also creating the panopticon among ourselves.”

“The government could do something, and the authorities are — sort of. There seems to be bipartisan support for ending the use of surveillance pricing in grocery stores. On the other hand, the U.S. government benefits from these surveillance tools. If the powers that be are not seeing the downsides to this issue, then it’s unlikely they’re going to ban surveillance technology. Companies also don’t have the internal motivation to curb these practices,” Pequeño said. “Privacy could soon be a luxury only afforded to the wealthy. To combat this, we must all reject the idea that surveillance is safety.”

In Gizmodo, AJ Dellinger said “Flock is trying to find out how much of the surveillance state you’ll tolerate.”

“After an immense amount of backlash against its cameras and automated license plate readers… Flock announced a slew of changes to how it handles and shares information with law enforcement,” Dellinger wrote. “The company is shortening its default data retention period from 30 days to seven… Flock will also start to proactively lock out a user flagged for potential abuses and will require administrative approval to regain access. That’s well and good in theory, though actually making good on that abuse prevention falls on law enforcement, which they have a pretty spotty track record on. 

“For instance, Flock previously implemented a tool that was supposed to automatically block impermissible data requests, like tracking a person seeking an abortion, as happened to a woman in Texas. But, in practice, it was wildly easy to circumvent. The Register-Guard reported that in one case, an officer entered a search reason of ‘hehehe’ and it was approved,” Dellinger said. “As for the actual communities affected by Flock, you’d be pretty hard-pressed to believe that a person ready to tear down a Flock camera is going to have their mind changed by shortening the recommended data retention window from 30 days to seven.”

In Salon, Amanda Marcotte wrote “people are sick of tech billionaires trying to control our lives.”

“Flock cameras have become a symbol of growing anger over the efforts by technology oligarchs to impose their dystopian fantasies on the country, replacing liberal democracy with a surveillance state,” Marcotte said. “Flock Safety embodies the dishonesty that has been the prevailing theme of tech corporate communications and marketing for at least the past decade. While the cameras are sold to the public as a banal traffic safety measure, they have prompted an outpouring of stories about how they’re being used to violate civil liberties and undermine democracy.”

“Flock’s behavior represents a microcosm of a larger trend in tech that should alarm freedom-loving Americans, regardless of political affiliation. Silicon Valley enriched itself with promises that the cyber revolution would mean more freedom and democracy by enabling the flow of information and communication,” Marcotte wrote. “Still, it’s a promising sign that people are rebelling against Flock cameras. Along with protests against data centers, it’s a sign that the public is desperate for a way to fight back against not just AI, but also the anti-democratic forces fueling this latest tech wave.”

In Cato at Liberty, Mike Fox argued “automated surveillance threatens a free society.”

“Taken to its logical extreme, the absolute prevention of crime would require proactive, universal confinement: If no individual enjoys freedom of movement, no crime can occur. A free society deliberately accepts a baseline of risk to prevent state-sanctioned oppression,” Fox wrote. “Proponents frame [ALPR] networks as objective, impartial alternatives to subjective traffic stops, promising to curtail crime while eliminating human bias. In doing so, they routinely dismiss public concern as populist paranoia or an implicit defense of lawlessness. 

“However, this pro-surveillance narrative relies on a fundamental misunderstanding of the role of government in a constitutional republic and ignores the reality that institutional power is inevitably abused. Far from an impartial equalizer, private surveillance grids construct an unconstitutional panopticon that automates police error, mimics authoritarian tracking, and invites systemic abuse,” Fox said. “Reclaiming constitutional privacy from private surveillance vendors requires bold, targeted action at the federal level… In a free society, companies that thrive on infringing upon constitutional rights should not be economically viable.”

In Townhall, Dmitri Bolt said “Flock Cameras are controversial, but this is what accountability can look like.”

“As a private company, susceptible to the forces of a free market, [Flock] must appeal to the broader public if it wants to turn a profit. It cannot do so if there is widespread opposition to its product,” Bolt wrote. “Flock is therefore incentivized to make changes that demonstrate it takes society’s concerns seriously. It is also important to remember that if residents were unaware these cameras were being installed, the failure lies less with Flock than with the lack of accountability local elected officials and law-enforcement agencies feel toward their constituents. 

“You may oppose Flock, and that is fair. But the company has been operating in communities for years,” Bolt said. “The more difficult question is this: why have voters continued to support the local officials who authorized its use without demanding transparency, limits, or public consent? None of this means we must support Flock. But it does challenge opponents to explain, with more than abstract appeals, why its well-documented public-safety benefits are not worth the surveillance risks involved.”

In The Atlantic, Charles Fain Lehman wrote “in defense of Flock.”

“The case for Flock is simple. Cameras help police catch criminals. That reduces crime through two channels: incapacitating offenders who are caught and convicted, and increasing the certainty of apprehension, which theoretically should deter criminals from offending in the first place,” Lehman said. “But is it true in practice? Although the research base is still developing, the answer is ‘probably.’… A 2017 study found ALPRs were correlated with a reduction in violent crime; a 2019 paper found suggestive but not conclusive evidence of a reduction in auto theft and robbery.”

“The Fourth Amendment’s protections exist exactly because of the very real potential for abuse of police officers’ extraordinary powers. The question, though, is whether we need to forgo the crime-reducing benefits of ALPRs in order to minimize the risks to our privacy. Such absolutism is unwarranted,” Lehman wrote. “Intelligently regulated, ALPRs can be one among many tools in the toolbox of smarter — and therefore less severe — police forces. Dumping the cameras would just be foolish.”

My take. Isaac Saul Executive Editor

I can’t get past how dystopian these private surveillance networks feel. Even in a world where we sign so much of our privacy over to big tech, accepting a wide police dragnet that’s ripe for abuse is one step too far. We don’t have to accept these cameras as part of our society, but save for a few restrictions, I believe we probably will.

Reminder: This is where we share a personal opinion. If you have feedback, criticism or compliments, leave a comment or reply to this email.

When I was in college, one of my final assignments for a senior-year writing class was to pen the first part of a screenplay. 

I set my film in the 2030s, and the plot was that there was a small group of people — only hundreds in the United States — whose photos and videos had never been captured and put online. They were all living together and communicating through analog technology in a kind of antiquated underworld culture, desperately hoping to avoid The Man, an amorphous system that used public and social media data to manipulate individuals and society at large. The opening scene was a couple waking up in bed together and the woman slipping out of the window and down the fire escape into an urban setting, where she deftly made her way through the streets while avoiding getting caught in the background of selfies and tucked close to building walls to dodge surveillance cameras.  

I often think about that screenplay, and the message I was hoping to convey: the dystopian nature of all of our images digitized and uploaded somewhere up there in the cloud, how you can’t board a plane or walk down a city street without being “captured,” and how we all seem to have completely ceded any right to our privacy. And, maybe most importantly, how our willingness to take a small technological step can create a totally different world from even 20 years ago.

Of course, I’ve been thinking about it even more as awareness about Flock cameras has been spreading like wildfire across the United States.

Transparently, and as my screenplay idea might convey, I have a viscerally and often irrationally negative reaction to surveillance networks. It’s not that I don’t want crimes to be solved — of course I do. I’m sure that if my wife were kidnapped, I’d fight to use every single Flock camera in America to find her. It’s not that I assume the worst of police officers or even the companies making this technology; I don’t. It’s just that by accepting the premise that we are always being watched, that our behaviors are constantly recorded and stored and shared, we are giving away something deeply liberating — a powerful sense of autonomy and independence that we’re slowly, consistently, and passively allowing to be snuffed out. 

I feel this often. I felt it this last week, when I tried to fall off the grid in Cape Cod, yet everywhere I went I was in the frame of someone’s iPhone filming on the beach or within the audio sphere of their Spotify playlists on rural hiking trails. I feel it anytime I fly, especially with the new airport norm of having your photo taken and handing over your ID. 

A few years ago, I was sitting at an intersection in suburban Pennsylvania late at night, waiting to turn right at a no-right-turn-on-red intersection, and the light wouldn’t change. After 25 or 30 seconds, with no cars anywhere in sight, I lost my patience and just turned right. A couple weeks later the red light camera ticket showed up in the mail, and I felt a deep sense of injustice — this sense that a cop, a real person, should have had to be there and spoken to me before giving me a ticket.

I know some of my reaction is more emotional than rational, especially as related to Flock cameras. Americans are recording and memorializing every minute of their day, posting every third thought that comes to their brains on social media, carrying around pocket-sized bits of technology that offer a much larger intrusion on our privacy than any perched camera ever would. We’re not just allowing this passively, but in many cases actively and voluntarily, out of mere convenience. Shoot, we have already turned our doorbells into security cameras, and now we’re supposed to get worked up about license plate readers? 

Yet, I’m thrilled about the attention, and the anger, and the distaste. Part of what makes Flock upsetting for so many people is that their proliferation is being pushed by the state and without the consent of the governed; the cameras are there, capturing and recording, whether we want them to be or not. Police departments are buying and installing them without any say from their communities, and sometimes in the face of widespread opposition. We sense, collectively, that something about this is wrong. That these cameras are a step in a direction we don’t want to go, even if their cause and purpose might be just. 

I’m glad for that. And now I think there are probably three paths forward:

Path one is that we accept that Flock cameras are going to be a “thing,” but we do our best to limit their use and make them as sensitive to our privacy as possible. We tighten the rules significantly on where they can be placed, who can access their data, and when. We operate with a really simple north star: Misusing this network is a grave offense. In this world, a police officer accessing the cameras to stalk his ex-wife doesn’t just get suspended or fired, he also goes to prison. We deter bad law enforcement behavior with the same harsh punishment law enforcement defenders always tell us works, and we hope camera use is narrowed significantly to solving consequential, serious crimes.

Path two is that we push to ban these kinds of cameras from being installed outright. This might be unrealistic, and the destination is almost less important than the direction, as the movement requires a political force centered on privacy. The thrust here is simple: Flock cameras are just a step too far toward a dystopian, privacy-free future. If we allow them to proliferate, what’s next? How long until every car is sold with a law-enforcement–designed sensor? Or every home security system can be accessed on an ad hoc basis to listen in on conversations or review footage? Or sidewalks and parks and light poles are equipped with listening devices, too? We can justify all manner of forfeited rights and privacy in the name of fighting crime or terrorism — we’ve been doing it for decades. 

Going forward, if police want to stick a Flock camera on a light pole in front of my house, easily watching all my comings and goings, I’d resist. It’s true that we get to record police, and that we get to put body cameras on them, but that’s because they are the state — accountable to us. Even so, I don’t get to access police body camera footage whenever I want, in a public database, the way police can now access Flock cameras. We re-frame the issue in simple terms: If law enforcement wants to access surveillance footage of any kind, they can get a warrant and collect it from privately available video devices that already exist across the country. If they want to solve crime, they can use traditional methods. Their problem, not ours. 

Path three is that we accept, as Mark Zuckerberg once said, that privacy is no longer a social norm. You can’t fight Flock cameras while walking around with an iPhone. Every website you visit or app you use is capturing your data — locations you visit are tracked by Google or Apple while conversations in your home are recorded by Google or Amazon — and yet we’re fretting over crime-solving cameras. Privacy is, actually, already dead, and Flock isn’t any worse than the surveillance we already submit to. There’s no point in fighting technology that at least is doing some good by solving crime. Five years from now, Flock cameras will have proliferated exponentially, become normalized in our society, and the “regulations” to rein them in are more superficial than limiting.

My strong preference is that we take path one or two, but my sense is that we are on path three. 

As a millennial, I’m now part of the last generation in America that will remember what it was like to go to high school or a concert or dinner without a smartphone. The generations behind me have no sense of that freedom, and no attachment to it, and no reason to think Flock cameras are any more of a threat than a Google search bar. Most Americans, even the ones my age and older, don’t bother to consider their privacy these days, let alone fight for it. 

Even I feel stuck: I take small measures to protect myself, whether it’s fancy privacy apps or leaving my phone out of my bedroom or occasionally rejecting terms of service. Yet any logical, rational approach to protecting your privacy in 2026, if you actually wanted to, would all but exclude you from common society. It’d be impossible to engage in the modern economy while truly holding onto your digital or real-world privacy. It is impossible. The screenplay I started to write 15 years ago is no longer set in a fictional future — that present is here. 

Except, in this reality, there’s no underworld society holding on to what we used to have.

Staff dissent. Carina Pacheco Associate Editor

Much of the concern around Flock cameras and surveillance is anchored in privacy, including Isaac’s. But I’m far less concerned about my likeness — the most public thing about me — being captured in public spaces. Whenever a serious crime happens or is threatened, we rely on video footage to identify, track, and bring the perpetrators to justice. It’s hard for me to be outraged at the existence of a technology that we’re thankful to have the moment we need it. Of course, bad people do bad things — the officers who misused Flock cameras for their own nefarious purposes are reprehensible and, like anyone who commits a crime, should be held to account when they do so. But arguments that use Flock cameras to prove we’re quickly descending into fascism ignore the baked-in guardrails we enjoy in the United States — accountability, free speech, and the rule of law prevent the worst-case scenarios from coming to fruition. Flock cameras are still new, but I’m confident the law will catch up, just as it has with geofencing or cell phone terms of service or other technology-meets-privacy issues. I’d much rather any shady, criminal, or threatening activity be brought to light than watch as it’s hidden or obfuscated under the guise of privacy.

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This day in history.

The United States women’s rights movement began in earnest during the 19th century and picked up steam after the Civil War. While early feminists called for both economic and political equality, the movement quickly focused on suffrage. In 1878, California Sen. Aaron A. Sargent introduced the Susan B. Anthony Amendment, which would grant women the right to vote, but Congress rejected it.

Suffragists continued working to secure women’s right to vote, but the “Winning Plan” was not concocted until 1916 by National American Woman Suffrage Association (NAWSA) President Carrie Chapman Catt. Catt’s proposal focused on gaining support for a federal amendment as well as state and local laws. As local support grew, and after several more rejections, Congress passed the Anthony Amendment in 1919, sending it to the states for ratification.

To become part of the Constitution, the amendment needed approval from 36 of 48 states. By August 1920, 35 states had voted “yes,” eight had said “no,” and four states didn’t plan to hold a vote. Suffragists pinned their hopes on Tennessee, which called a special legislative session to vote on the amendment. 

On August 18, 1920, after the amendment had passed the state senate, the Tennessee House held its votes on the 19th Amendment. The legislators first voted on a motion to table the amendment (which would have effectively killed it), but after a delegate deadlock, the Speaker called for a direct vote. During the final vote, Rep. Harry Burn — who had at first voted to table the amendment — surprised the chamber by voting “Aye.” Unbeknownst to everyone at the time, in Burn’s pocket was a letter he’d received that morning from his mother, Phoebe “Febb” Burn, urging him to “be a good boy” and vote for suffrage.

The amendment passed the Tennessee legislature by one vote, making Tennessee the final state needed for ratification. The 19th Amendment, prohibiting voting discrimination on the basis of sex, was officially enshrined in the Constitution eight days later.

The extras.

• One year ago today we wrote about the Trump–Putin meeting in Alaska.
• The most clicked link in our last regular newsletter was our ad for FinanceBuzz.
• Nothing to do with politics: Peculiar pets of history.
• Our last survey: 1,478 readers responded to our survey on the Wisconsin gubernatorial primaries, with 75% saying they think David Crowley (D) will defeat Tom Tiffany (R) in the general election. “The common sense of Wisconsin voters will likely prevail in electing Crowley,” one respondent said. “Tiffany will make hay out of Crowley’s extremism, but it will be extremely close,” said another.

Have a nice day.

Betty Bromage, 97, was hospitalized after a stroke in 2025 that affects her to this day. The incident created challenges for a hobby she picked up at age 87: wing walks, or walking on the wings of a biplane while it is in flight. A year after the stroke, Bromage set out to break her own Guinness World Record of being the oldest female to complete a wing walk — accomplishing her goal on August 4, all while raising money to support the stroke unit where she was treated. Bromage also hinted that she was not done yet. “I’ll have to think of something when I’m 100 — something special,” she said. BBC has the story.