Rachel Levinson-Waldman

@rlevinsonwaldman

Director, Liberty & National Security Program, Brennan Center for Justice. Raised in Austin TX; in DC for last 20+ years; MA/WA/IL/CA/NZ in between. Owner of extremely cute dog.

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Rachel Levinson-Waldman@rlevinsonwaldman· 18h

It was a bit of a thrill to see my @BrennanCenter report with Angel Diaz featured on the show - and it's both gratifying and dispiriting that the issues we raised six years ago are not just salient today but multiplying. 2/19

Picture showing John Oliver gesturing next to visual of 2020 Brennan Center report on license plate readers with text box saying "...drivers have been pulled over because a reader read the numbers on their license plates wrong and... tagged the vehicles as stolen."

Rachel Levinson-Waldman@rlevinsonwaldman· Feb 14

It has been a week. I wanted to work out. I also wanted some wine. I decided to combine them. Everything is fine.

Rachel Levinson-Waldman@rlevinsonwaldman· Feb 4

The tl;dr:

Judicial authorization of home entries is not merely a constitutional formality; it serves as an important safeguard for every household. Independent evaluation of the facts helps ensure that officers do not, for example, enter the wrong homes (as immigration officers have done recently in Portland and Minnesota) or for the wrong reasons. Allowing ICE to enter homes using administrative warrants would be concerning even under an administration that has demonstrated strong commitment to the rule of law. But the current stakes are much higher. ICE’s recent pattern of unlawful behavior and aggressive enforcement tactics, combined with a gutting of internal oversight mechanisms and refusal to hold officers accountable for blatant misconduct, makes plain that the executive branch cannot be trusted to police itself. Courts must play their constitutionally assigned role to protect the civil liberties of the people in this country.

Rachel Levinson-Waldman@rlevinsonwaldman· Jan 11

A determination that a public safety concern exists should never be based to any degree on the constitutionally protected political or religious beliefs or the ethnic, racial, national, or religious identity of an individual or group, nor should it be based on violence at a previous event that resulted from police activity.

Only data relevant to a law enforcement agency’s resource and planning determinations to ensure public safety should be collected. If officers find no indication of criminal activity while monitoring, then social media data should not be retained past the event date. If online surveillance uncovers information connected to an existing criminal investigation, then that data may be retained in accordance with relevant statutes and departmental rules.60

Data should not be shared with other law enforcement agencies absent a demonstrable showing of necessity to address a specific and articulated public safety concern and a memorandum of agreement with the receiving agency confirming that it will abide by the limitations set out above in any use or further dissemination of the data.

Rachel Levinson-Waldman@rlevinsonwaldman· Jan 11

2. Preparation for Public Events

Publicly available social media content may be monitored or viewed in advance of significant public events solely to determine the resources necessary to keep participants and the public safe. When agencies can make these determinations in ways that do not risk incidentally viewing First Amendment–protected information — such as by consulting a permit application or contacting an event organizer directly — these means are preferred. All social media monitoring should be approved by an individual at the rank of police chief or a named senior-level designee.

Social media surveillance should only be undertaken when specific, articulable, and credible facts demonstrate a public safety concern justifying the monitoring. Such concerns and the supporting facts should be documented in writing. The documentation should include a description of the social media searches to be made, including identification of any search terms, individuals, or hashtags monitored; the justification(s) for those searches; and the factor(s) necessitating social media as a necessary tool for making resource determinations.

Rachel Levinson-Waldman@rlevinsonwaldman· Jan 11

And of the ones that do, most are woefully inadequate.

The Brennan Center researched 328 law enforcement agencies serving every incorporated city with a population greater than 100,000. We found that 162 agencies, or 49 percent, have policies available on their website that address the use of social media by department employees to view or collect information for a range of purposes. Few of the policies offer concrete, practical guidance to department employees or notice to the public regarding how their social media data might be collected, monitored, or retained, and many do not disclose the rules governing the use of undercover accounts or include safeguards for First Amendment–protected activities.

Moreover, there is no reliable way to assess whether the agencies that lack publicly available policies do not use social media for investigative or other purposes, do use social media for those purposes and have not published their policies, or use social media but have no written guidance in place at all.

Rachel Levinson-Waldman@rlevinsonwaldman· Dec 15

We had friends over, and everyone got their own menorah!

Rachel Levinson-Waldman@rlevinsonwaldman· Nov 24

As the letter notes, the U.S. has "long branded itself" as a leader on the values of freedom of speech and association "on the global stage". But now: 4/5

Students and faculty at American universities have now been arrested, detained, and even deported in retaliation for their speech and other expression, frequently without basic due process. The State Department has instructed consular officers to conduct intensive reviews of protected speech on social media, with the express purpose of punishing visa applicants and holders for their lawfully-expressed views. These actions all have the same effect: punishing free speech and association and side-stepping due process while depriving the American people of the opportunity to hear a diverse range of views and stripping the United States of one of its greatest sources of soft power.

Rachel Levinson-Waldman@rlevinsonwaldman· Oct 10

This is a terrific piece, with really important insights on the state of defense AI contracting. Here's a tl;dr - but you should read the whole thing!

This year’s NDAA risks repeating past mistakes with a new generation of military contracts. The Department of Defense inspector general has issued more than 20 reports since 1998 documenting contractors overcharging the Pentagon. Weakening acquisition safeguards will not only pave the way for more waste; it also undermines the Pentagon’s ability to discern the proper role of AI and other emerging technologies in filling critical capability gaps, particularly at a time when claims about what these technologies can accomplish do not always stand up to scrutiny.

Rachel Levinson-Waldman@rlevinsonwaldman· Aug 21

Instead, this expanded review will magnify the already significant risks of the government's ill-conceived approach.

Rachel Levinson-Waldman@rlevinsonwaldman· Apr 18

There's no obligation to prove that the people being surveilled are doing anything criminal - also a common dynamic. Per data scientist Cathy O'Neil: “If [these kinds of companies] successfully get people to trust their algorithm, with zero evidence that it works, then it can be weaponized.”

Rachel Levinson-Waldman@rlevinsonwaldman· Mar 31

Cherry blossoms, Washington DC.

Rachel Levinson-Waldman@rlevinsonwaldman· Mar 18

snyder.substack.com/p/the-evil-a... Snyder's whole piece is worth reading, but these two paragraphs crystallize the propagandistic aspects of these deportations.

Rachel Levinson-Waldman@rlevinsonwaldman· Mar 16

This crystallizes one of my (many) fears about the administration’s reprehensible targeting of Mahmoud Khalil: a major media outlet blames (a large segment of) the Jews. Good they’ve changed the headline - pls do better next time.

Headline: ‘The Palestinian exception’: Trump limits campus free speech with the complicity of Zionist Jews

Headline: How antisemitism avoided the fate of antiracism

Rachel Levinson-Waldman@rlevinsonwaldman· Feb 25

This isn’t a dog whistle; it’s a bullhorn. Anti-Semitism all the way down.