Gov. Abbott blocks funding in Texas for Flock cameras as bipartisan fury brews
The automated license plate readers aren’t popular with the public. Politicians are catching on.
Republicans and Democrats once praised Flock Safety as a protection tool for American communities. Now politicians across the political spectrum are turning against the mass-surveillance technology.
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott (R) froze state spending this week on the shoebox-size cameras that have proliferated across the nation.
The flow of taxpayer money halted just before the Texas Tribune published an investigation probing how one state agency poured at least $30 million into expanding the reach of the controversial automated license plate scanners.
“There is a crackdown across Texas,” Abbott spokesperson Andrew Mahaleris said in a statement.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2026/08/29/flock-cameras-stir-bipartisan-fury-gov-greg-abbott-blocks-them-texas/Open linkView original on lemmy.world
10 replies
I like the unintended joke of how Greg Abbott is a registered trademark.
Oof, I hadn't noticed. I wonder if that's a Markdown thing, or a lemmy thing probably. I've noticed there's a colon-system for emoji like
:smibrings up a selectable list of emoji that match. So I'll test: (R) - if that's(R)then it was something else, but if that becomes Ⓡ (which I just typed using the compose key) then it's Lemmy. lolThe view from Voyager:
The view from Safari:
Rare Abbot win.
You know its bad when even the hardcore Republicans are turning against it.
he must’ve not personally profited enough from it (yet)
That and data centers
Rare backpedal you mean. If he wins in November this is all going back to BAU.
Seriously! Abbott turned the Rio Grande into a "Saw" movie with giant blade traps... And even that monster is like "nah, that's some bullshit."
Crazy.
He'll just quietly use another company that's doing the same thing but not getting raked by the press.
So he kicked us in the nuts and is now screaming, "Truce bro! Let's take it down a notch!"
https://www.texastribune.org/2026/08/28/texas-flock-cameras-auto-insurance-fee-mvcpa-grants/