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Homeland Security To Scan Citizens Exiting US
An anonymous reader writes "The US Department of Homeland Security is set to kickstart a controversial new pilot to scan the fingerprints of travellers departing the United States. From June, US Customs and Border Patrol will take a fingerprint scan of travellers exiting the United States from Detroit, while the US Transport Security Administration will take fingerprint scans of international travellers exiting the United States from Atlanta. The controversial plan to scan outgoing passengers — including US citizens — was allegedly hatched under the Bush Administration. An official has said it will be used in part to crack down on the US population of illegal immigrants."
As someone who occasionally visits your country (with a New Zealand passport and valid work visa), I can tell you that all non-US citizens are already subject to this indignity, for no better reasons than you will be. It's unfortunately just the next step (I've never been fingerprinted going into any other country, or any other time at all for that matter).
In all fairness, he did say one kind of country, for which I think he meant "viciously authoritarian", or something similar.
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No, they're going to throw you into a room, until after your plane leaves. Then you can go buy another ticket and refuse again...
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They take your fingerprints when you buy a gun.
No, they don't. Unless you live in a police state like Illinois or something, but if you live there, you have no business with a gun. If you want a gun, move to a state that isn't so gun-unfriendly. There's at least 40 of them.
Here in Arizona, you can buy all the guns you want with no fingerprints, just the regular Federal instant-check form.
However, if you want a concealed-carry license, you need fingerprints for that.
Besides a few token operations to live up to its name, [DHS] focuses almost entirely on getting rid of illegal immigrants. Has nothing to do with security.
Not any more. Why was the DHS at the tax day tea parties in several cities? Here's one example. This is an agency used by the party ruling the executive branch to intimidate supporters of the opposing party. It was used that way under Bush and sadly is apparently used that way under Obama.
Just callin' it like I see it.
TFA seems to be wrong about this including US citizens. While I think fingerprinting anyone, citizen or not, coming into the country isn't something we should be doing, and certainly not when exiting, the bit about fingerprinting exiting US citizens is found nowhere other than in the article from IT News Australia. The actual DHS press release is very specific that this is a planned extension to US-VISIT and, as such, only applies to non-US-citizens:
http://www.prnewswire.com/cgi-bin/stories.pl?ACCT=AUSASAIR.story&STORY=/www/story/05-28-2009/0005034173&EDATE=THU+May+28+2009,+01:22+PM
Several additional articles all clearly indicating that this applies only to non-citizens:
http://www.fcw.com/Articles/2009/05/27/Web-US-VISIT-pilots.aspx
http://www.nextgov.com/nextgov/ng_20090528_7835.php?oref=rss
"Wherever you go, there you are."
Did anyone see the Editor's note? Should probably update the Post.
Editors Note - This story originally contained a representation that the biometrics trial in Atlanta and Detroit included the fingerprint scanning of US citizens. This has since been proved to be incorrect and the story has been modified - only non-US citizens will be expected to provide a biometric record.