Everyone has a SWAT team
A bit back, the Department of Education was looking to get some short barreled shotguns. And we wondered why. Seems it’s so they can conduct SWAT raids to collect student loan payments.
Really? It’s come to this?
Update: Tam: Look me in the eye and defend this.
The trouble is, there is no one to justify it to. This is an out of control bureaucracy that our elected officials have neither the time nor inclination to rein in. Just like all the other bureaucracies.
June 8th, 2011 at 10:22 am
The department of education issues a search warrant… Something wrong with that….
June 8th, 2011 at 10:40 am
Rope.
June 8th, 2011 at 10:52 am
ANY Bureaucracy doesn’t CARE about the outcome. They ONLY care about policy and procedures.
June 8th, 2011 at 11:13 am
So any Federal Agency can issue its own Search Warrants w/o having to take it to the Judge? MAYBE, under the Patriot Act, IF one needs to pull a “Jack Bauer” to stop a Nuke from going off, but the D.O.Ed. going after Delinquent Loans by SWAT TEAM?
Screw the chores, I’m buying more Ammo.
June 8th, 2011 at 11:18 am
What evidence of what crime did they expect to find? Is defaulting on a loan a crime now?
What idiot judge signed that warrant?
There is no reason, plausible or implausible, for the Department of Education to have a SWAT team. Or any law enforcement powers at all. Period. End of sentence.
If they need to investigate fraud, or any other crime, let them call the FBI.
As Tam says – rope.
June 8th, 2011 at 11:23 am
The only thing left now is to start issuing ARs and shotties to crossing guards so they can pull dynamic high risk street traverses.
June 8th, 2011 at 12:06 pm
Don’t get bogged down in the minutiae of who allegedly issued the warrant or what it was allegedly for. Let’s not forget that the article was written by a reporter; they know as much about this as they do about shoulder things that go up. Remember the Gell-Mann Amnesia Effect. Looking at the purview of the DoE IG’s office, this had to involve fraud or something, not a simple default.
The larger question is “Why does every federal agency need their own internal cop shop, to include SWAT teams, which they then have to use at the drop of a hat to justify funding?”
Ignoring for a moment the very constitutionality of the Department of Education, why can’t they investigate cases and then farm out arrest warrants to locals or even the US Marshal’s service? Why does every federal agency need their own tac team? Give a bureaucrat a hammer, and it’s only a matter of time until he turns and whacks you in the head with it.
June 8th, 2011 at 12:29 pm
Go easy on the government.
We need to collect on the outstanding student loans so we can loan or give the money to Greece.
June 8th, 2011 at 12:31 pm
May be we need the name of who issued it so we can, you know, “take care of” them.
June 8th, 2011 at 12:34 pm
Tam: Excellent point, on all counts.
I think that, when the time comes to rebuild the nation (and it sadly seems to be more and more likely to be “when” than “if”), there is a strong argument to be made for either denying the federal government any law enforcement powers at all (i.e., if they need law enforcement they can go to the locals) or placing very severe Constitutional restrictions on it, including limiting it to a single agency with very limited scope of authority.
Either way, we really need to work now on reining in these SWAT raids.
June 8th, 2011 at 12:52 pm
Anyone have an updated link. That story appears to have disappeared from the web site.
June 8th, 2011 at 1:16 pm
Here’s another link.
June 8th, 2011 at 1:17 pm
@ Tam
“there is a strong argument to be made for either denying the federal government any law enforcement powers at all (i.e., if they need law enforcement they can go to the locals) or placing very severe Constitutional restrictions on it”
There are currently constitutional restrictions on what they are doing, and yet they ignore their sworn oaths to protect and defend what you speak of. What makes you think that they will not change the entire game when the collapse comes under the guise of being shot by their storm troopers? Perhaps a look back at history will allow you to see what the collapse will look like…
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=4353655982817317115#
June 8th, 2011 at 1:23 pm
blounttruth,
Why do you quote Jake at me?
June 8th, 2011 at 2:06 pm
You sign a loan you sign a contract. Stoodintz you is pwned!
Student loans are the one loan-type that is basically non-defaultable, and with some of the strictest penalties – especially now that the .Gov took over the loan programs.
There is no statute of limitations on the .Gov suing you for COMPLETE PAYBACK of a defaulted student loan. Plus penalties and interest.
Private loans are still available but much more costly (interest-rate depends on credit-score, most Stoodintz have NO credit score worth a crap) than the Feds money – remember kiddies, the first one’$ free! Not.
But there is a Bright Side – Full-time military service also counts toward public service forgiveness. I imagine that public-service also counts, so most students are on the hook for some kind of Public Service nowadays if they default, and 43% default – so it’s Americorps for you slackers!
June 8th, 2011 at 2:37 pm
@ blounttruth: There’s an unspoken assumption in may statement that those who prefer freedom have won at that point – because if the authoritarians win they’re certainly not going to restrict their newly won power, are they?
And would you rather we not restrict a power that has been so prominently abused? What’s your alternative?
June 8th, 2011 at 3:42 pm
So I see I have to say this here, too.
More recent reports tell a different story.
Department of Education Office of the Inspector General says it had nothing to do with student loans, and was related to an “ongoing criminal investigation”.
Which makes a lot more sense:
A) OIG’s job is investigating fraud and embezzlement and other corruption
B) Debt default gets you garnishments and collections, not searches and raids for your person.
Yes, the guy who lived there said it was about the loans.
No, I don’t think he’s right, and suspect very strongly it was his inference; if your ex was being investigated for a crime you didn’t know about, but was in default on a giant loan, and the Department that is in charge of the loans executes a search warrant… well, you might assume it was about the loans.
But that doesn’t make it so.
June 8th, 2011 at 4:11 pm
I’m finding it interesting that even the updated stories don’t mention what the search warrant says they were looking for – that’s pretty unusual for the media in pretty much any search that makes the news. It’s obvious that the information is available, because the new link Tam provided starts with a big picture of the homeowner holding a copy of the warrant – which should have a description of what they were looking for.
June 8th, 2011 at 4:17 pm
So what’s the OIG doing with a police-force that does no-knock warrants and such? Who are these Police Inspectors General?
June 8th, 2011 at 4:19 pm
“I’m finding it interesting that even the updated stories don’t mention what the search warrant says they were looking for ”
Until they actually find her, they aren’t going to say, since the investigation is still ongoing. (We’re still in the part of the Law & Order episode with the guys driving around in the cars, and not yet to the part where they’re getting rebuffed on the plea agreement at the jail.)
June 8th, 2011 at 4:22 pm
DirtCrashr,
They are federal cops with federal badges. With federal badges come federal guns. I need to set a macro to copypasta “See Inspector General Act of ’78 and Homeland Security Act of ’02.”
If you want to take the guns and raid jackets away, you need to take the badges and arrest powers away, which I am totally cool with.
June 8th, 2011 at 4:44 pm
The press usually doesn’t care, if they have the information. The homeowner is holding a copy of the warrant in that picture (according to the caption), so the press has access. I’m just surprised that the press isn’t publishing that information – or at least saying that the warrant is sealed, if that’s what the available copy indicates – it’s effectively already public record.
June 8th, 2011 at 6:16 pm
My wife still won’t let me get the “Come Back with a Warrant” doormat for our front door.
But I have instructed her to never, ever let a law enforcement officer in our home or autos without a warrant.
We own nothing illegal and, except for occasionally stepping on the gas pedal a little too much, we don’t break any laws, but no one is coming into our home or vehicles to look around unless they have a warrant.
If these law enforcement no-knock entry types want some real action, let’s send them to our Southern border and let them do some good.
June 8th, 2011 at 6:17 pm
“I’m just surprised that the press isn’t publishing that information – or at least saying that the warrant is sealed…”
Didn’t DoE say that? I think so, but I need to check.
June 8th, 2011 at 6:22 pm
Its easy enough to see why they have these powers. Its a word game. federal swat teams are just a differnt kind of military force operating on US soil. Name it something else, and the lawyers in congress are just fine with using them to shove a boot up any of our rear ends if we make a fuss.
June 8th, 2011 at 10:57 pm
The tv station has put the warrant on their website. Looks like a fraud investigation as Tam said.
There is no indication in what is published that they considered anyone in the home to be a risk.
I think the central issue here is really the routine use of SWAT for any type of warrant whatsoever. It has gotten out of control, and expanded beyond SWAT’s intended purpose, and people are being killed and terrorized because of it.
June 9th, 2011 at 12:20 am
And people will keep on being killed and terrorized because of it until those who are signing off on the justification for the terrorizing and killing as well as those doing the actual killings start suffering casualties either during or after they do the deed(s).
I suggest the time has come for a re-reading of “Unintended Consequences” as well as “Absolved”…
June 9th, 2011 at 1:13 am
Why do I have the feeling that the people who sign off on these SWAT raids, are the same people who supported John Kerry in 2004 while he painted our troops in IRAQ as terrorists?
June 9th, 2011 at 10:19 am
SayUncle:
You are absolutely RIGHT!
The problems in the FEDGOV are not with the political appointees (who receive the bulk of the attention) but with the career bureaucrats beneath them who do all of the work across several administrations.
Likewise, the problem in Congress is not with the elected official but with the staffers who do all of the research and policy development.
Both bureaucrats and staffers are un-elected, un-accountable, and largely hidden. Yet, they write the laws, interpret the laws into actionable regulations, and enforce the regulations they write (which have the force of law).
To rein in this government, you must get rid of the career people in it. The momentum for smaller government is stronger now than in decades past, and one way to begin is to start by freezing FEDGOV hiring, attriting the ranks, and firing where at all possible.
June 9th, 2011 at 11:10 am
The whole thing, with the Inspector General bullpucky – and especially the Czars – is all so damn European it’s sickening.
When did we ever vote to get these vermin and parasites in America? It’s a totally gross Euro-disease like bed-bugs and Socialisticalis or Marxodium.