The woman who actually lives in the house had just moved to Oklahoma City from Maryland with her family about two weeks earlier.
“I keep asking them, ‘who are you? What are you doing here? What’s happening,’” she said. “And they said, ‘we have a warrant for the house, a search warrant.’”
She said they ordered her and her daughters outside into the rain before they could even put on clothes.
“They wanted me to change in front of all of them, in between all of them,” she said. “My husband has not even seen my daughter in her undergarments—her own dad, because it’s respectful. You have her out there, a minor, in her underwear.”
Marisa said the names on the search warrant were not hers or anyone in her family.
“We just moved here from Maryland,” she said. “We’re citizens. That’s what I kept saying. We’re citizens.”
She said the agents didn’t care.
“They were very dismissive, very rough, very careless,” she said. “I kept pleading. I kept telling them we weren’t criminals. They were treating us like criminals. We were here by ourselves. We didn’t do anything.”
Marisa said the agents tore apart every square inch of the house and what few belongings they had, seizing their phones, laptops and their life savings in cash as “evidence.”
“I told them before they left, I said you took my phone. We have no money. I just moved here,” she said. “I have to feed my children. I’m going to need gas money. I need to be able to get around. Like, how do you just leave me like this? Like an abandoned dog.”
Before they left, Marisa said one of the agents made a comment.
“One of them said, ‘I know it was a little rough this morning,’” she said. “It was so denigrating. That you do all of this to a family, to women, your fellow citizens. And it was a little rough? You literally traumatized me and my daughters for life. We’re going to have to go get help or get over this somehow.”
Now, Marisa said they have, quite literally, nothing.
“I said, ‘when are we going to get our stuff back?’ They said it could be days or it could be months,” she said.
Marisa said she is left with nothing but questions.
Illegal search and seizure. Where’s the nra? The various groups that swore to uphold the constitution?
How long before people start pretending to be ICE to basically break and enter into homes to rob people? Not like they can fight back, or even question things, or have due process, if someone in an ICE vest shows up at your door.
Why is ICE seizing anything outside of whoever they supposedly had a warrant for? Did the warrant say take all electronics and valuables as they are being used to hide/fund someone we don’t like, but the people that live their, yeah their fine let them be? Like what? How is this not just want to be terrorists fucking over people with impunity?
It is so demoralizing to try and explain civil asset forfeiture. I’ve never had a single person believe that it’s real when I tell them about it - everybody insists that it can’t possibly be true since it’s so flagrantly unconstitutional.
It’s “constitutional” because they’re accusing the “money” of being used illegally. There’s no actual person being accused here, but if you want to get your money back you’ll need to prove it’s innocence in court.
It’s ridiculous. At least the Institute for Justice has been winning court cases against this, but there’s still a long way to go: https://ij.org/issues/private-property/civil-forfeiture/
Edit: typo
John Oliver had a segment on this that may help convince people that it is real: https://youtu.be/3kEpZWGgJks
We decided we needed to be able to shut down drug dealers by seizing their money without need for any real proof. Since then the majority of seizures, 84%, are civil most incidental to purposeless searches that turn up no crime. Many seizures are in fact under $1000 and most are under $2000. In theory you can get your money back but it often would cost thousands so for most victims its impossible to actually get money back without spending more.
Basically for decades the authorities have been acting as robbers and have collectively stolen billions from the people directly often stopping minorities for driving while black and treating the $400 in random bob’s wallet as proceeds of an imaginary crime they don’t need to substantiate. Being black and having $400 is enough.
We decided we needed to be able to shut down drug dealers by seizing their money without need for any real proof.
This is why it was so important to declare a “War on Drugs.” Most people thought it was just political rhetoric, but it was far more than that. By declaring a literal WAR on drugs, it offers the government an array of options that aren’t available in peacetime. One of those being the ability to alter the way suspects/combatants and their possessions/ weapons are treated. Money and valuables can be treated as a tool of drug dealing, and confiscated as spoils of war.
Youre really misunderstanding what declaring an actual war is or is not. Technically the US has not been in an actual declared war since WWII.
The Vietnam War, the Korean War, the Iraq wars, none of those were declared as actual war by congress. The war on drugs is just political rhetoric and has no actual legal bearing.
You cant declare formal war on drug use because drug use isnt a recognized sovereign country
Who is “we”? Please leave me out of this cult.
They have been doing shit like this for years anyway. The cops in some communities even outright stop countless vehicles coming out in order to 'seize drug money’and they end up taking any cash the person has without any evidence whatsoever. This is some Robin Hood villain shit.
Robin Hood was stealing from the rich to give to the poor, not robbing the poor for the rich.
How do you know they are even ICE. Not saying they aren’t agents, but there was an EO that basically repurposed a lot of other agencies to become ICE deputies. DEA, ATF, etc.
The cops have been the biggest thieves for a long time.
Remember folks, every vote counts. We did this to ourselves.
I’ve said it before elsewhere but it needs to be heard…
It’s just wild to me continually seeing posts not understanding how this all works, and how it would play out. It’s like the people who thought China paid the tariffs…
The house is almost tied. That’s who passes bills, handles impeachments, some of the most powerful committees are, and who impeaches Presidents…
218 Republicans, 213 Democrats.
Let’s see, take New York for example.
26 representatives total, 19 Democrat and 7 Republican.
5 of those were within 2 points last time their seat was up.
People who think that New York is blue, their vote doesn’t matter, skips the votes for the House and Senate and end up losing a Blue house seat but later complain that nothing changes are literally the fucking problem.
Every. Fucking. State. Is. Like. This.
Apathetic morons who don’t realize that the president is only held accountable by the other branch of government then wave their hands around when they did jack shit to help put people in place to, are the fucking problem.
District 3 of California was lost by 24,000 votes. District 22 was lost by 3,000.
Those two seats in the house, along with the close ones in New York, Jersey, Michigan, Illinois, Washington, hell every state… Are what makes the House of Representatives or breaks it.
So, if you think that your vote for president doesn’t matter, so you skip voting and let these other seats slip, yes, you’re a fucking moron who can’t grasp basic concepts of government that are taught in 4th grade.
And don’t get me started on the State House/Senates, how they define voting laws and voting zones and engage in gerrymandering.
Every fucking vote counts.
And until the country realizes it, and starts acting on it, we’ll keep getting the shit we deserve.
House needs a simple majority, and two thirds of the Senate.
Democrats would need ~18 seats.
First, that won’t happen in 2026.
Even the best cases make it hard to win enough by 2028. Which is why impeachment is just not something we can hold out for.
Gerrymandering is part of why this is a problem, which is done at the local level, and again why every vote counts.
How could it play out? Assuming some absurdly weird upside down world just opposite of what we’re living in, this is the only path just looking at the numbers…
Again, Democrats would need to gain 18 net seats. Seats Potentially in Play (Republican Incumbents): This requires looking at seats up in upcoming cycles.
- Class 1 Seats (Up in 2026):
- Highly Competitive Targets: These would be the first priority. States where Democrats have won statewide recently or that lean only slightly Republican. Examples based on recent political history might include:
- North Carolina (Budd-R)
- Alaska (Sullivan-R) - Unique dynamics with ranked-choice voting.
- Stretch Targets: States that are more Republican but could potentially flip under exceptionally favorable conditions (like the hypothetical turnout).
- Iowa (Ernst-R)
- Montana (Daines-R) - Depends heavily on candidate matchups.
- Kentucky (McConnell-R’s seat - potential retirement changes dynamics)
- Kansas (Marshall-R)
- South Carolina (Graham-R)
- Very Difficult Targets: Solidly Republican states requiring overwhelming Democratic turnout and significant shifts among other voters.
- Texas (Cornyn-R)
- Mississippi (Wicker-R)
- Alabama (Tuberville-R)
- West Virginia (Capito-R)
- Oklahoma (Mullin-R - Special election winner)
- Wyoming (Lummis-R)
- Idaho (Risch-R)
- Arkansas (Cotton-R)
- Nebraska (Ricketts-R)
- South Dakota (Rounds-R)
- Louisiana (Cassidy-R) - Jungle primary system.
- Highly Competitive Targets: These would be the first priority. States where Democrats have won statewide recently or that lean only slightly Republican. Examples based on recent political history might include:
- Class 2 Seats (Up in 2028): (Looking further ahead)
- Highly Competitive Targets:
- Maine (Collins-R) - Often competitive, depends on matchup.
- Georgia (Perdue/Ossoff dynamic showed competitiveness, depends who holds it after '26 potentially) - Assuming GOP holds a seat here.
- Stretch Targets:
- Michigan (Peters-D currently, but listing potential GOP flips back if one happened hypothetically before 2028) - Generally leans D, but could be contested.
- New Hampshire (Shaheen-D currently) - Generally leans D, but listing potential GOP flips back.
- Very Difficult Targets: (Many solidly Republican states)
- Tennessee (Hagerty-R)
- Alaska (Murkowski-R historically, depends on dynamics)
- North Carolina (Tillis-R)
- Iowa (Grassley-R seat potentially)
- Texas (Cruz-R)
- Kentucky (Paul-R)
- And many others similar to the 2026 list (SC, AL, MS, WY, ID, NE, SD, KS, WV, OK).
- Highly Competitive Targets:
It’s going to take an absolutely historic level of pain to both drive enough people to vote MAGA out to make this change though.
The amount that’s being excused, sanewashed, and just drowned out with other absurdities…
We’re on all on this shit ride until some new wildcard comes into play.
No impeachment, no Supreme Court, no guardrail is going to change that.
Something new and unaccounted for is the only feasible catalyst.
It is true, every vote counts, but not for the Democrats. They have approved Trumps household and supported him in other legislation already. Biden continued much of Trumps legacy of deportations, wall building and raiding innocent people. The laws around “civil forfeiture” have been expanded by Democrats on state level and upheld by Democrats on the federal level throughout the past 30ish years.
Unless the leadership and party elites of the past decades are purged from the party it will never be a vehicle of change, only of maintaining the decline at a slower rate than under the Republicans.
EDIT: Another example of the Democrats making sure that progressives that could challenge Trump are blocked as much as possible on their way. https://www.jezebel.com/75-year-old-democrat-who-beat-aoc-for-key-role-resigns-after-4-months
I wish people didn’t vote against Bernie in the primaries.
I’d vote to support progressive candidates, but neo-liberals can legitimately go fuck themselves.
We should unite and convince people to stop voting for establishment candidates. It’s their turn to fall in line since progressives aren’t doing it.
I wish people didn’t vote against Bernie in the primaries.
They didn’t.
Remember folks, every vote counts. We did this to ourselves.
Who is “we”? Keep me out of your cult.
I didn’t nominate any cops and I don’t vote for them. That’s how we got here.
every vote counts
Ummm, not to be an ass but no. The usa has some of the highest number of disenfranchisement in the world. Then you have people like me who’s vote does not count at all in american elections (there are dozens of us!).
Confidently incorrect.
Like I said, every single local election, from city BOE and councils, to county boards to state officials count.
The local elections are who draw the districts are who disenfranchise.
The county courts, the district courts who are elected are who rule in favor of gerrymandering.
So if you skip a vote, if you are too busy, too tired, too hungover, that’s it. It’s on you.
If you can’t grasp that, it’s on you.
Not be that guy, but the person you’re replying to isn’t exactly wrong in saying “every vote counts is wrong” in some cases.
Being pedantically literal, yes, every vote is counted.
The reality of First Past The Post voting and the Electoral College is that the only votes that “count” insofar that they actually affect the outcome of an election are votes for the winning party. Now add on to that the common understanding that both major parties only care about what their corporate donors have to say, and that individual voter participation isn’t likely to influence anything other than the party campaign strategy for the next election.
That means that if enough people vote as a collective to flip which party wins, then and only then does their vote count for anything meaningful. People should vote anyways, but it’s not hard to see why someone might be just a little bit disenfranchised when their participation in the democratic process seems to result in nothing but wasted time because they live next to a bunch of a conservative hicks.
You are absolutely right about smaller state and local elections, though. Those are where each vote actually has a chance to be meaningful.
I am not american, and if I was one of approximately 5.1 million (that is about 1 out of 44 or so people) who have lost the ability to vote, no I don’t have a say in any level of us politics.
You are as a nation well past the “lesser evil” party saving you. You are full on into the sort of terrible collapse shown in the subject of the article you are promoting. As a side note, with how the silly two teams system of yours works, the dems if back in power will forever be a little worse then before trump.
Voting doesn’t matter when both candidates are right-wing.
That’s literally why we’re here.
Once everyone has seen it, totally.
Don’t suppose you’re in the camp wanting to disenfranchise voters, are ya skippy?
It should be illegal…
But with alternating between Republicans and neoliberals for 50 years, no one has ever actually put in serious effort to reign in police. Asset seizure is 100% legal and since they’re “charging” the money/property there’s no presumed innocence.
Biden didn’t fix policing, Obama didn’t, and under Clinton it got worse in large part due to a bill Biden wrote.
Obviously Republicans have been worse, but the point is shit doesn’t ever get better.
We have a good DNC now, that won’t block good candidates, but that’s a very recent development
Quick edit:
This meant to be a reply to someone else, but something weird is happening
We have a good DNC now, that won’t block good candidates, but that’s a very recent development
Wouldn’t be so sure about that. Ken Martin is out there trying to stop David Hogg from primarying incumbents.
Good, Hogg has no traction and never will win an election. He should be the last choice for the left.
