Comment by Terr_
10 hours ago
Depends, how are we defining "false positive"? Ex:
1. Detained the incorrect person
2. Detained the correct person, with the correct legal status
3. Detained the correct person, with the correct legal status, but in unlawful circumstances
4. Detained the correct person, with the correct legal status, in ostensibly-lawful circumstances, but in a way which is unconstitutional or crazy
An example of the final category are the immigrants that spent years being vetted, following the law, and doing expensive paperwork to be citizens. ICE snatched them when they showed up on at the last second as they were to take their citizenship oath. [0] Not because of anything they did, but because today's Republican party has decided that it's OK to hurt people based on their "shithole" country of birth.
[0] https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/dec/30/us-citizensh...
These are all forms of false positives but the most popular news stories seem to be where they detain the correct person, correct legal status, lawfully, and the story happens to gloss over the facts about the legal status and focuses on the hardship. Yeah, it's a hardship to be split from your family, I can't deny that. But I'm not aware that most countries are very sympathetic to illegal immigrants.
If anything I find the stories featuring white/European people oddly racist because they seem to assume that I, the reader, will assume a white/European person couldn't possibly be in violation of immigration rules. But all the ones I've read turned out that they were indeed in violation of immigration rules.
Overall as a potential immigrant to the US myself, I find the process capricious and that US citizens by birth don't fully appreciate how painful it is or why it shouldn't be that way. But I don't find it notably worse or more onerous than the vast majority of immigration policies of other countries in practice.
I'm not sure what you're talking about. The most popular stories are the ones when they detain US citizens, rough them up, and then dump them on the side of the road somewhere without even apologizing.
[1] https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/jan/13/ice-immigrat...
[2] https://www.pbs.org/newshour/nation/a-u-s-citizen-says-ice-f...
[3] https://www.propublica.org/article/immigration-dhs-american-...
I assume this is probably a function of our respective locations, because the most popular stories I see as an 'outsider' are those that would discourage tourism or immigration, not those that would worry already-citizens.
To address your stories specifically, my point would be that I'm still not sure whether this shows the US is notably worse on this than any other place.
E.g. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windrush_scandal
> the story happens to gloss over the facts about the legal status and focuses on the hardship
Suppose you have a "civil infraction" against you, like an unpaid parking ticket, running across the road in an unsafe way, or overstaying a visa. It's terms of US law categories, it's less than graffiti on a fence. In this case you were "indeed in violation" of it.
However, what happens next is some recently hired weirdos in mismatched camo-gear claiming to be police (with no ID) surround you on the the sidewalk, drag you into a van, and imprison you for months without trial. You are purposefully shuffled between different prisons in different states to prevent your own lawyer from being able to find you.
Meanwhile, some internet dude nicknamed 0x40 comes along and says: "Ugh, why do you guys keep glossing over the facts about their parking tickets to focus on the hardship? Yes, it's a hardship to be split from your family, I can't deny that, but..."
In short, one of the several problems right now is the that even for victims that actually did something wrong, the "hardship" is frequently illegal and disproportional. The truthfulness of the cause does not justify the effect.