“Unlike traditional Temporary Flight Restrictions, the NOTAM does not provide geographic coordinates, activation times, or public notification when the restriction is in effect near a specific location. Instead, the restricted airspace moves with DHS assets, meaning the no-fly zone can appear wherever ICE or other DHS units operate.”
“In practical terms, a drone operator flying legally in a public area could unknowingly enter restricted airspace if an ICE convoy passes within the protected radius.”
I hope this gets tested in court and declared unconstitutional for being overly vague and arbitrary. For example, Montana used to have some maximum speed limits that were just "reasonable and prudent", but they were eventually rejected by courts as being too vague (what's prudent to you may not be prudent to someone else). This is similar, in that the FAA has a no fly zone but they don't actually publish what it is.
Catch-22 and 1984 weren't supposed to be instruction manuals.
The rule of law has left the building. The SC is willing to rubber-stamp nearly anything right now.
Waiting and hoping for common sense to prevail is what allows authoritarian regimes to bulldoze through existing laws and norms. Even if the courts were an avenue for redress, they are being overwhelmed by the daily barrage of new illegal and unconstitutional actions. Once the courts get around to addressing these cases, the damage has been done and the precedent has been set.
Also note, i.e. stuff like statutory rape has been upheld even in cases where the perpetrator in all good faith thought the victim was 18+, the victim initiated selling the services, and the victim provided fake ID showing they were 18+.
So there is not necessarily any need for mens rea in the US legal system.
So you take that the saccade speed (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saccade) + speed of visual buffer reaction + reasonable time to break and you get a max speed for that.
Same goes when you have two points of attention, like traffic in front of you and merging traffic, the speed gets reduced to compensate.
Coincidentally, folks won't be able to live stream their encounters but I'm sure that's totally unrelated...
“For my friends everything, for my enemies the law.” ― Oscar R. Benavides (Peru)
This creates a chilling effect for normal people who don't want to become professional activists.
They can then after the fact come down on that person without having to get facial recognition, grab cellphone beacons, or other similar steps.
(Also, had this been in effect and if a drone had been a part of the project, which would not have been unreasonable [0], it would have been really annoying if I was carrying a portable do-not-fly zone and needed to get permission from the agency to take some photos of the equipment I was carrying.)
[0] To be fair, part of this project was in a location where operating a drone would have been inappropriate for reasons that have nothing to do with the FAA or national security.
> TO: DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE (DOD), DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY (DOE), AND DEPARTMENT OF HOMELAND SECURITY (DHS) FACILITIES AND MOBILE ASSETS, INCLUDING VESSELS AND GROUND VEHICLE CONVOYS AND THEIR ASSOCIATED ESCORTS, SUCH AS UNITED STATES COAST GUARD (USCG) OPERATED VESSELS
Much more restrictive than just ICE operations.
See Loper-Bright
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loper_Bright_Enterprises_v._Ra...
From what I understand their jurisdiction didn't begin until 500 feet into the air.
Not only is it overreach, it's encouraging impediments on what has been largely considered private property.
FAA has asserted jurisdiction below 500' for a long time: balloons and kites since 1963, ultralights since 1982.
FAA certainly asserts regulatory authority over aircraft below 500', everything does takeoffs and landings of some sort, but ground operations are also subject to regulation.
@FAA can you tell I am still annoyed by your poorly thought out highly spoofable clear text RemoteID implementation and lack of integration to ADS-B... Also, NOTAM != TFR unless all drone operators are using foreflight to consolidate all surrounding NOTAMS which hint, they are not.
This is probably not the case here, but IIRC there are criminal charges attached to violating NOTAMs, so there’s still some kind of deterrence.
And if they don't, there is no basis for enforcement, so we're done.
I'm not a libertarian anymore, but I can tell you, I was a genius fortune teller.
My assets performed really well ignoring economic orthodoxy about supposed 2% inflation.
I can confirm altitude restrictions can be turned off.
Edit: owner of matrice m100 and a few other DJI drones
i dont think the concern is drone weaponry, but the photography, and intelligence that may be derived.
i expect to see an attempt to work against any cameras that may cover activities
You can still fly drones in and around ICE agents, bases, etc. and literally their words cannot stop the drone.
Pilot here. This is not unprecedented. The same kind of thing applies to all major sporting events. They have no-fly zones but FAA provides NO official source for getting the info of when such events occur and why. It is left to the pilots to find out all major sporting events and stadiums around and when they have events, under serious penalties. It forces pilots to care about sportsball.
But in this instance, the movements of ICE are specifically hidden by the government - heck, they've even threatened to prosecute people who publish this information!! It is the literal definition of a Catch-22.
So while there isn't a line drawn on the ground, it's completely different.
You had me up to the "selling the services" part.
If you are 'engaging' with someone in a criminal enterprise it's probably reasonable to assume they might misrepresent certain facts to make the sale.
Trump has ordered troops to be ready deploy, pretending lines exist is silly
I’ve never seen a Buddhist led genocide for instance, and I think a big part of that is the emphasis on looking inward for answers instead of outward.
Religions are inherently centralized, and sociopaths are always drawn to centralized power.
(who am I kidding, even my fake statement is too coherent for this clown car of fascists)
Then come affordable drones and suddenly the FAA attempts to exert full regulation over the space.
To answer your question, roughly 2012 is when this started.
This is not correct. See 14 CFR 101, 103, and 105. There's a long history of the FAA concerning itself with hobbyists flying model aircraft, moored, and unmanned balloon, rockets, kites, parachutes, and ultralights. I mentioned this, you glossed over it. Their histories predate 2012.
https://www.ecfr.gov/current/title-14
>Helicopters, planes, and quadcopters could be flown freely under general guidance, with no actual enforcing regulations.
Helicopters and airplanes have been regulated under 14 CFR 91 for a very long time, and were regulated by the CAA (the Civil Aeronautical Authority, precursor to FAA), and their operations are certainly regulated below 500'. And it is definitely enforced.
If you're referring to the years long regulatory lag for drones/sUAS before the The FAA Modernization and Reform Act of 2012 which also gave us 49 USC 44809 "Exception for limited recreational operations of unmanned aircraft" - ummm, well all I can say is welcome to aviation. It's been significantly regulated the whole time, and just because some folks were not aware of this fact, doesn't mean it wasn't.
Maybe check out The Great Waldo Pepper with Robert Redford though. That begins in a genuinely unregulated era.
This is why no one person should have so much unilateral power.
The TFR in TFA appears to be much more ambiguous than this. I'm not sure they're really comparable.
https://adds-faa.opendata.arcgis.com/datasets/faa::stadiums/...
The irony is the M100 is genuinely great hardware - the payload capacity, the SDK access, the flight time with extra batteries. But DJI's geofencing treats the entire DC metro like a no-go zone, which makes sense from their liability perspective but means the thing is basically a $7K shelf ornament unless you want to deal with LAANC authorizations for every single flight.
The larger agricultural drones are also amazingly impressive, those I've seen up close doing real work and they are so reliable it is almost boring.
I wonder what the reason is that yours behaves the way it does, that sounds like a real challenge to find out though with the closed system like that.
Drones that rely on GPS are very iffy as soon as the GPS fails, I've seen more than one inexplicable 'fly-away' happen. I've found a really neat trick to test drones that are not 'known good': just find yourself a long stretch of really light chain and tie it to the drone. As long as it behaves: no problem. But if it tries to take off by itself at some point the length of chain weighs more than the drone can handle and it will stop ascending. That way at least you have some kind of safety measure that does not immediately impact the drone in a material way as long as it is near to you.
If I can ever figure out how to repurpose some of these electronics maybe for some kind of AI robot (yes, the gimbal + camera optics are so nice, it feels like a sci fi eyeball from 2037!) I will be back in business.
Some people sell exploits to "jailbreaks DJI drone firmware but with current US admin I don't think it is prudent to do too much "off-label" usage of this kind of tech.
But seeing this geofencing post.... I just had too much experience trying to get around these restrictions to actually believe that they'd drop the geofencing, especially after a consumer drone ban.
Thank you for the chain suggestion, that would have been intelligent to do. Matter of fact, my father may have made that suggestion at the time. Alas, that was a very move fast and break things period of my life.
You’d need a digital system with a gimbal, and the DJI O4 Pro alone will run you $200+. For dual lenses with different zoom levels and feed switching it’s getting pretty expensive very fast.
FPV is a skill you can learn though and for filming armed thugs I actually can't think of a better tool because it allows you to fly the drone out of LOS so you can do it from a relatively safe position while still getting footage that matters.
For extra protection you could even abandon the drone and record the video directly on your headset.
If you ever shook your head at theocratic regimes such as Iran, well maybe look a little closer to home. "But... the people in charge of Iran are hypocrites, they do nasty stuff at home behind closed doors."
Again, may I point to Mom: "we have mullas at home".
Mark my word, if and when these preachers get control of the [Republican] party, and they're sure trying to do so, it's going to be a terrible damn problem. Frankly, these people frighten me. Politics and governing demand compromise. But these Christians believe they are acting in the name of God, so they can't and won't compromise. I know, I've tried to deal with them.
Barry Goldwater
And often the biggest reactions against the targeting of minorities are not triggered by acts against the minorities directly but by the acts against majority-demographic activists working on their behalf.
So if you are against the terrorists, you are also a terrorist.
You should. It's not meant for your vanity and it represents and extreme overreach by the government. It doesn't make you "cool."
> But you couldn't pay me to go there.
Of course we could. Aside from that this mentality always shocks me. There are more civilians in the US than government agents. What were you expecting when you got here? It's madness..
> One man's terrorist...
Is another mans freedom fighter. Sure, fine, if you want a civil war. Perhaps a more civilized approach is called for? Unless you particularly enjoy digging graves for your friends.
It certainly is, but one side doesn't seem to think so.
The mentally-ill are running the asylum and executing citizens. No matter what crazy shit the gop/tea party/maga have accused the left of NONE of it came to pass until they themselves were in power.
The administration WANTS a civil war; they’re ensuring one happens.
If you’re against owning guns, you’re in for a world of hurt. So buckle-up butter cup, shit is gonna be insane soon.
That's your opinion, I don't necessarily share it.
> It doesn't make you "cool."
What made you think that I thought it looked cool. I just realize that at some point play time is over.
> Of course we could.
No, you can't. And the fact that you think you can is interesting. 'No' means 'No'. You can not pay me to go to the United States, period. I have lived on the border for years and have friends there, already missed a funeral. It isn't going to happen until sanity returns and frankly I don't see that happening in the next decade or two so most likely I will never go back there.
> Aside from that this mentality always shocks me.
What shocks you? That people abroad look at the USA and evaluate their options? What's so shocking about that?
> There are more civilians in the US than government agents.
Indeed, and a good chunk voted for this and I can't easily tell them apart.
> What were you expecting when you got here?
Well, the last time I went it cost me a couple of really good boots. Who knows what it will cost me next time?
> It's madness..
Yes, but it is not my madness and I don't have to factor in ICE into my daily affairs. As a visitor into the United States that would be a major factor, as many people have already found out, which you seem to conveniently skip over. I don't visit places where the rule of law is that shaky.
> Is another mans freedom fighter. Sure, fine, if you want a civil war.
No, I don't want a civil war. But I can't stand by idly while people are oppressed by their government and that makes it much better for me not to be exposed to such situations. Countries I will not visit: Russia, China, United States, Iran, North Korea, most of Africa, quite a few more countries in Asia. Countries that I would reluctantly visit: Most of Latin America, probably some others. Countries that I'm happy to visit: all of the EU, some countries bordering the EU, Japan, Australia, New Zealand.
> Perhaps a more civilized approach is called for?
Have you watched the news recently? I think it is pretty clear what the civilized side is in these conflicts.
> Unless you particularly enjoy digging graves for your friends.
No, I don't enjoy that. But my friends that have died in one particular struggle did so in the firm belief that what they were doing was just and right and I share their belief. I'm old enough to realize that if you don't stand up when it matters then you're just as bad as the rest.
Germany had a good chance to stand up to fascism and blew it. If fascists take over where I live or nearby you can count me in to be on the other side. I've read my grandmothers' diaries and I have written about that before, it is a stark reminder of what happens as soon as the gestapo starts doing the rounds.
See also Alito's outrage about deportations being fast tracked to SCOTUS.
>In one of its most consequential rulings of the year, just before breaking for the holidays last week the Supreme Court held that President Trump acted improperly in federalizing the National Guard in Illinois and in activating troops across the state. Although the case centered on the administration’s deployments in Chicago, the court’s ruling suggests that Trump’s actions in Los Angeles and Portland were likewise illegal.
https://www.latimes.com/opinion/story/2025-12-30/supreme-cou...
That is not what the decision stated - there was even a quote from a justice saying that the administration could easily attain the same result with a different legal mechanism, all but encouraging such a change in behavior.
Edit: the ‘improperly’ portion of your quote is the operative term
[BTW, Trump wasn't spied on -- Russian assets were spied on and it turned out that some of those communications were with Trump's team. There are ~100 pages of these communications captured in the Mueller report. ]
John Roberts and other conservative members of the court do have an ideological commitment to the Unitary Executive Theory of the presidency (foolishly, in my view) but this has the potential to benefit both Democratic and Republican presidents.
very few supreme court cases make it to headline news, and the ones that do are the ones you're thinking about it. those are the ones split by ideological lines, which are less than 10% of what SCOTUS rules on. the government loses many cases unanimously as well. there are some unsigned opinions that do punt things back to lower courts that may be in the government's favor, or not.
all to say, its more nuanced than that. the trend, as a last and compromised bulwark, is there, but that's not how the court consistently behaves.
At the appellate level, Trump appointed judges vote in favor of his policies at a substantially higher rate than any previous president at 92% of cases.
https://www.scotusblog.com/2026/01/looking-back-at-2025-the-...
https://www.nytimes.com/2026/01/11/us/politics/trumps-appeal...
So yes the data is in, and yes it’s bad, and emphatically yes it’s exactly what this thread is saying. In case anyone reading in good faith was wondering.
Technically true I guess, but learning to fly a recent DJI drone takes about ten minutes. You're not so much flying it, as telling it what you want and letting it fly itself. And the controller has a built-in tutorial with a simulator.
In the scriptures God is depicted as someone who sometimes is willing to have a debate, and reason with people, of course not to learn anything, but to explain why things are (or must be) the way they are.
In some instances, God is even depicted as willing to listen to man and do things he otherwise would not have done, so long that they don't deviate from his fundamental purpose.
Which specific series? Why do i need to know when sportsball happens, any variety of it? Oh, and concerts too. Why do i need to know when taylor swift is in town?
Nope, it is not nearly that simple, and consequences can be dire.
https://tfr.faa.gov/tfr3/?page=detail_0_0367
I don't disagree with you that there should be no onus on pilots to have to hunt for this information (which is why I would guess that SEAMS is maintained, but not sure) - my point only is that this isn't really comparable to the TFR mentioned in TFA. All the Stadium TFRs are static; the "national defence" TFRs are not.
> Nope, it is not nearly that simple, and consequences can be dire.
Isn't ATC going to yell at you before you enter such a TFR?
If there is one resource I can point you to that may help to inspire you have a look at this:
Top engineering skills, very likable character and an amazing source of hard tech knowledge.
I'm watching this youtube video (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tlD0C5CrWcA) and he apparently built this out to support his Master's research at the University of Maryland, where I went to school for undergrad.
The long arm of the DMV no-fly zone is no joke!
He's right in many ways, unfortunately I really need all those other features as well, but I think there is something to be said for ripping the inner control loops (rate, level, stabilization) out of say Arducopter and replacing it with this stuff on a separate micro controller. It's much easier to divorce stability and primary flight characteristics from things like high level mission planning and such and it isn't rare at all for such things to get in each others way in the usual suspects (Betaflight, INAV, Arducopter and various derivatives of these three).
DJI has got to be pretty sore about the ban. The geofencing was always voluntary on their part as I understand it, basically an attempt to proactively engage with the US and other aviation authorities in good faith. Then, when Trump blew up the truce by ordering the FCC not to approve future products, they may have felt they had no reason to continue to cooperate.
That's what I was wondering -- whether or not that speculation really does describe the situation accurately. If it does, it sounds like good news for you, since that hardware may now be usable after a firmware update. I only have a 249g first-gen Mini, myself... and being out in the middle of nowhere, I don't know if it ever had those restrictions to begin with.
I think you're both being manipulated by cynical people who have extensive access to the media that you do not.
Seems far more likely, no?
Trump and ICE are at war with a middle aged mother and a VA nurse. And they're doing all this in Minneapolis because the gangs in LA scared them off.
This was done despite multiple reports of the military officers who studied the problem and stated that the Japanese pose no threat, are often US patriots, and need not be isolated.
Imagine Russia interning everyone of Ukrainian descent up to third generation because of the war, and everybody be like "Well, fine, they are doing a reasonable thing, let them go on".
The the natural outcome should be rebellion. Why would it be civil war? Do you presume that the "other half" completely agree with Trump and would literally fight you to the death over it? You bandy about these terms as if you do not understand their true meaning.
> The administration WANTS a civil war
So you're going to play exactly into that? Why on earth would you give your "enemy" precisely what they seem to want? You can't detect the manipulation here?
> you’re in for a world of hurt
One of us is.
So yes, there certainly would be some level of civil war.
It would be wishful thinking it would only be the people rising up against the government. If we had any level of that type unification then we wouldn’t be in the mess we’re in now.
> It seems hard to call that an example of rubber stamping for an administration that did not exist yet.
The Trump administration absolutely did exist, both in the past and the present (waiting in the wings) in July 2024 when the ruling was issued.
While it's true that all past and future presidents are affected by the ruling, there's exactly one former president and presidential candidate at that time that was likely to face criminal charges for actions taken while in office, in either first or second terms.
It's a bit much to claim that the ruling doesn't have at least the appearance of benefiting Trump exclusively, especially given the timing. The ruling caused many of Trump's trials to be delayed to be effectively concurrent with the 2024 election.
We went 235 years without clarifying that presidents had presumptive immunity; all previous presidents (even Trump) acted under the presumption that prosecution for official acts might be unlikely but was possible.
That is going to be the court case of the century by the way. Maduro will have lawyers begging to represent him. It will be America on trial and I'm looking forward to the Trump administration absolutely bungling it.
For anyone unaware, one of the main criticisms of that ruling is that the president commanding the military is always considered an official act, and this ruling means the president enjoys "absolute immunity for official acts within an exclusive presidential authority that Congress cannot regulate such as the pardon, command of the military, execution of laws, or control of the executive branch."[0]
The ruling made no carveouts or exceptions for blatantly illegal orders. The president could unilaterally eject or kill any member of opposing political parties and future administrations (if there are any) would be completely unable to legally hold them accountable for their heinous crimes.
I’m sympathetic to your concerns, agree that it was a poor ruling, and frankly think we need a constitutional amendment to address the excessive power the presidency has, but the justices aren’t making these rulings without having a real, justifiable rationale behind them and they aren’t making these rulings because they’re in the tank for Donald Trump (Justice Alito excepted)
"When he uses his official powers in any way, under the majority’s reasoning, he now will be insulated from criminal prosecution. Orders the Navy’s Seal Team 6 to assassinate a political rival? Immune. Organizes a military coup to hold onto power? Immune. Takes a bribe in exchange for a pardon? Immune. Immune, immune, immune. Let the President violate the law, let him exploit the trappings of his office for personal gain, let him use his official power for evil ends. Because if he knew that he may one day face liability for breaking the law, he might not be as bold and fearless as we would like him to be. That is the majority’s message today."
As a practical matter, if the president is ordering the military to do those things and the military is obeying those orders, we are far beyond the point where concepts like legal immunity matter.
Yes. This was basically agreed upon before that the president has legal immunity for exercising his constitutional powers, but was never explicitly ruled on by the court. If the president does something outside his legal authority, then that isn't his presidential duty, and he can be punished.
> which has many times been interpreted by the SC as "anything he wants to do while president."
This part is just false
Your choice of words is rather telling.
I think you intended to communicate the Supreme Court would balk at it happening.
Yes.
Much like Kavanaugh balking at ethnicity-based stops after allowing language + skin color based stops. By then, it’s too late.
The ruling makes it very clear that core constitutional powers have conclusive and preclusive (absolute) immunity.
Other official acts have presumptive immunity.
In all cases, the motive is above question. If Trump has a fight with Melania, he can order the CIA to rendition and disappear her. He doesn't even need to claim that she's a spy. It can never be questioned in court. He can then pardon everyone involved, so even the underlings face no court.
In all cases, the official acts are explicitly not admissible as evidence. Using the example above, the District of Columbia can try to prosecute for murder, but is unable to introduce the fact of the order as evidence. If Trump receives a bribe, the official act that he undertook at the briber's behest is similarly inadmissible.
Incorrect. The commander in chief, same as all military officers, has the authority to issue lawful orders to the chain of command below him. He does not have the authority to issue unlawful orders, and if he does, his subordinates have the legal obligation to disobey them. The president does not have constitutional power to order arbitrary violence.
> If Trump has a fight with Melania, he can order the CIA to rendition and disappear her
No he can't because this is against the law, and it is therefore not a presidential power. The president has no constitutional authority to order agencies to violate the law.
> He can then pardon everyone involved, so even the underlings face no court.
This is, unfortunately, true. But it has been true as long as the US has existed.
> If Trump receives a bribe, the official act that he undertook at the briber's behest is similarly inadmissible.
This is true, but the act of taking the bribe is not an exercise of presidential power so he can be charged with accepting a bribe. This is not new to the recent SC decision.
This decision says that he can issue unlawful orders, and there's nothing the court can do about it. He's immune. You don't need immunity for lawful acts. The very best you could argue is that this prevents prosecution for "gray area" acts that may or may not be lawful. But this decision essentially says that all of those "gray areas" are effectively lawful.
Decide that the protesters in Minnesota are an insurrection? Maybe they start turning up with long guns, like countless previous protestors? Order the troops to fire. It's up to them if they do or don't, but it's guaranteed if they don't, they'll be in courts martial for disobeying the order. The meeting minutes, the reports, what was known and when it was known, Trump's motive: all of them don't matter at all. The official records are inadmissible, his motive is unquestionable, and he is absolutely immune for his orders as commander-in-chief. He can pardon everyone and make them federally immune as well. Only state courts can do anything, far after the fact.
>No he can't because this is against the law
What exactly do you think immunity makes someone immune from?
Just to be clear: you are disagreeing with a dissenting Supreme Court justice on how much the law protects the president. Are you a lawyer? Do you know more about how much the law binds the president than the literal office that has the final say on the law?
See how stupid that argument is?
You should read the decision.
So yes.
And that wasn't anywhere near the amount of deference the president gets when it comes to emergency and war powers.
The chain of command may or may not signal (similarly to the Supreme Court) what kind of fig leaf lies are required.
From there it’s a game of telephone until a barrel of a gun.