Holidays me. A legal u. S. Citizen born and raised was subjected to having my face scanned by the department of Homeland Security not only when i return to the United States from my travels abroad but at the very beginning of my trip as well. Now legally u. S. Citizens like me can opt out of these scams but in no way was that made aware to us at the departing gate nor were we told that upon reentry instead we got the brusque dystopian style treatment weve seen in many a Science Fiction film that left many of us fell of me and my fellow travelers feeling violated for simply wanting to travel beyond u. S. Borders but having your face scanned by a faceless Government Agency feels invasive imagine what immigrants and refugees must feel like when after their long hard trek to the shining city on the hill that is the United States the u. S. Government reaches into their mouths and takes the very strands that make up the core of their being regardless of their consent im talking of course about the new Pilot Program launched this january by the u. S. Government that will not only collect d. N. A. Samples from the thousands upon thousands of people that are detained regularly by the u. S. Immigration officials but then they will send those samples to our trusted friends at the federal bureau of investigation to be held indefinitely in their criminal database in a memo released by the department of Homeland Security the New York Times reports that u. S. Citizens and permanent residents holding a green card who are detained could be subject to d. N. A. Testing as well as Asylum Seekers seekers and people entering the country without authorization and that refusing to submit d. N. A. To submit your d. N. A. Could lead to a misdemeanor criminal charge. My goodness from facial scans and our airports the d. N. A. Swabs at our borders seems that now more than never it is a very good time to start watching the hawks. Like that. I got. To. Know them a bone the watching the hawks to roll them for and joining me today to discuss the taking of d. N. A. And facial stands by the United States government at our borders investigative journalist ben swan ben now yeah i know that you like myself have recently traveled internationally were you going to ask were you subject of in your face scanned upon departure the way i was and was there any signage or helpful notices informing that you that as a u. S. Citizen you can opt out of these scans if you want to know i heres what was interesting so i actually went to australia leaving the u. S. I did not have to go through any kind of face scan but coming back into the country i did have to go through it when we landed we actually then it in l. A. Accident l. A. X. They forced us to go through a facial scanning because they didnt even make us fill out the forms you know when you get on a plane in your travel into the country or into a new country coming out here you have to fill out a customs form right and then submit the form but they said you dont need to submit the forms but we got off the plane we did have to have our faces scanned so our faces rescanned in order to go through that process and whats really interesting about the story tyrell though is that most people dont realize this d. H. S. S. Has been wanting to do this for a long time and not just on International Flights for people coming into the country or leaving the country they were pushing as of april of last year to actually have facial scans in every airport for every domestic flight so if you get on the domestic flight they wanted to mandate that you had to go through a facial scan they couldnt get that through there were too many fights and legal challenges from the a. C. L. U. So instead they decided to move on International Flights and thats where it is right now you know what it was going to ask what is their excuse or why what are the reasons that theyre saying that we need these scans and i mean it do they have a justifiable excuse beyond the kind of you know omnipresent well and it makes things safer its for security and things like that and do the civil liberty issues with this outweigh the support these supposed security benefits. Well thats what we dont know in terms of the legal standing of whether or not it outweighs that look yeah youre absolutely right the excuse thats being used thats always to this right is this is about security protecting the homeland weve got to know its coming and we have to be able to recognize whos getting on planes because those of course are the greatest threats to our National Security or you know planes in the hands of wrong people 20 years later this is the line thats still being used after 911 but heres whats interesting is that we dont know as to whether or not a court would ever side with the government on this because as i said theyve backed off when the a. C. L. U. Began challenging them saying you cant just scan every single face thats getting on an airplane because essentially what youre doing is youre creating a barrier to the right to travel we have a constitutional right to be able to move about and encumbered and so if you make it essentially a process where you have to be searched and have a facial scan in order to get on a plane youre preventing people from being able to do that because the only option now would be to say i want to get on a plane so we dont know where the courts would fall on it because the a. C. L. U. Never got a chance to challenge it but again it has already happened here on these International Flights and i think it should be challenged in court as well whether or not you should be forced to have facial stance taken before youre allowed inside the country you know its interesting too because when i look when i think about what i want to like without that that bothered me but then when i read another story about the fact that you know immigrants and even green card Holding People travelling into this country and you know people so you can you know refugees are now getting their d. N. A. Swab at the border that just got implemented the beginning of january that really frightens me and it raises the question in the mind maybe you can help me answers why why do we need to collect the d. N. A. Of citizens and noncitizens who are taken into custody by customs and Border Patrol i mean that sounds absolutely crazy especially when you look at the it just sounds nuts to me when you look at it because it by the time they even get it over to the f. B. I. These people have already been let loose anyway right so the people have already been let loose. The type of d. N. A. Samples we get to the f. B. I. So it makes you question why would we need a. D. N. A. Reservoir of all the different people who are coming into the country illegally and where as you said certain green card holders now were being told us citizens will have to go through this but think about just the sheer numbers so p. H. S. Saying about last last year they took about 7000. 00 d. N. A. Swabs theyre expecting this year once out of this is that put into place taking about 7 148000 swap thats a massive difference right 7748000 where would you be catalogued who will keep them how will they be useful and heres another question for you so you know d. N. A. Samples the biggest track people what its not like oh well someone took their d. N. A. Sample return the list of the country now we can find that when we leave them with the life slots they have find that after the fact so if somebody later on i suppose the rest of it and then matched the d. N. A. Then you would have a match but how would that serve a purpose that has any kind of usefulness to what i think thats the big question around us we dont know what answer seems like an awful lot of waste of time energy and money for an issue that really we the initiative is important you know immigration and what to do with these refugees is important at the end of the day i dont think that swapping their d. N. A. Is going to make that any easier or any any better at the end of day but i want to thank you so much for coming on always a pleasure having you on and bringing your insight to our audience thank you sir. Several things. With tensions still white hot following the United States assassination of Iranian Military leader qassim solo money and irans were told tori strikes on u. S. Military bases in iraq it doesnt take a team of experts or political prognosticators the tell you that before the end of 2020 war between the United States and iran is a very real tangible possibility but what are the American People ready for a potential u. S. War against iran i mean does the American People really know today that the cia actually deposed to be a coup a democratically elected leader of iran back in 1953 and action that led to much of the antiu. S. Sentiment we see today can u. S. Citizens even find iran on a map thats a good question well a recent poll done by politico interviewed nearly 2000 registered voters and found out that nearly 80 percent of them couldnt actually locate the middle eastern country so many questions well r. T. Americas own john he took to the streets of miami to put political findings to the test and here is his report. A new survey by the research for Morning Consult a new site politico finds that quote fewer than 3 in 10 registered voters can identify the Islamic Republic on an unlabeled map the poll was conducted january 4th and 5th after the u. S. Killed iranian general qassam saloon money and just days before iran bombed a us air base in iraq 28 percent of the 1995 registered voters surveyed in the poll were able to accurately locate iran on an on label map of the middle east region only 23 percent could identify iran on a larger also unlabeled map well we printed out our own unlabeled world map and hit the streets of miami to see if people here had any better luck pointing out iran im doing a poll talking to people can you point out iran on this map. Help me with that. I think its in this general area. Here youre absolutely correct yes point out iran on the map iran. Here right there you got it right around here. Pretty much tell you what value iran youve got the middle east region iran. Next and you know that saudi arabia is the its his big one here is iraq here. Runs right there. Its right there so yeah yeah i will say thats what i said yeah yeah. Its. Right there he got it on iran out on this map iran. Iran iran a country add iran iran. Does right here oh thats africa but close close what about you can you point out i can just point out but you tell me very sure its right here is this it is this it now right there you know its. One of the if you get to be on t. V. And that they are by the way those young men said if the u. S. Did go to war with iran they think the u. S. Quote would hold its own speaking of which the Morning Consult political poll also found that while most people surveyed supported the u. S. Strike on general somani 69 percent said the attack made war with iran more likely and half said they thought it made the United States less safe. And i guess those folks down in miami do actually they can actually pick ron out on the map all right everybody as we go to break watchers dont forget to let us know what you think of the topics weve covered on our social media be sure to check out watching the hawks the podcast which is now available on spotify awful music and everywhere you listen to your favorite or maybe not so favorite podcast coming up representatives from both the left and the right to u. S. Politics join us to debate and discuss some of the most important and unique news stories of the day including social Media Censorship surrounding the rising tensions between the United States and the state to watch. It on up. To. As the democrats gear up to officially start their 2020 president ial primary that is spinning to assess Donald Trumps performance in office a report card of sorts where is he kept his promises and where has he come up short will any of this really matter and. Descriptions sound appetising even for the owners so how to choose head Food Industry is telling. Yes but to feed our pets more based on what they want to sell us then was necessarily good for the past turns out may not be this people believe we have animals that have you know. They have auto immune disorders these allergies we are actually creating these problems its a huge epidemic of problems all of them i believe can be linked to a very simple problem of diet and some dog owners so heartbreaking stories about their pets last treats the larger corporations are not very interested in proving or disproving the value of their food because theyre already making it to 1000000000. 00 on it and theres no reason to do that research. The bridge of speech and expression is one of the most important if not the most important tenet of any Free Thinking Society that is why it became our very 1st amendment to the u. S. Constitution but what happens when the freedom of speech and expression runs headlong into u. S. Foreign policy and corporate interests this is what we are seeing play out in real time as c. N. N. Business is reporting that instagram and its Parent Company facebook are removing posts that voice support for slain iranian commander because im so on money to comply with u. S. Sanctions you see stolen money and the Islamic Revolutionary guard corps were designated as a Foreign Terrorist Organization last april which means that any social media post in support of the Iranian Military leader could be viewed as supporting a terrorist in fact after saw him on his killing instagram suspended at least 15 accounts belonging to iranian journalists according to a Statement Released by the international. Aeration of journalists when pressed as to why a facebook spokesperson told the media that quote we operate under u. S. Sanction laws including those related to the us governments designation of the i r g c and its leadership well joining me now to practice a little free speech on this story and more including the upcoming final democratic president ial candidate debate before the Iowa Democratic caucuses are 2 voices representing the left and the right in u. S. Politics democrat strategist and political analysts. Across im so sorry to. Be strategists believe i apologize for that you just talked about. Me and im so sorry lets get into this i want to ask you both should instagram and other social Media Companies be silencing reporters journalists or anyone who shows support for solo money or iran or would you ill say absolutely i think that this is a clear violation of the freedom of speech but i also feel like these in this particular case these are journalists the expectation that they are going to uncover and from from their viewpoint being journalists who are based in based in iran being journalists who are going to have a vision of iran that a lot of our american journalists do not who also have a historical understanding of whats going on in the sense that also our journalists do not and even americans many have questioned whether or not the killing us all the money was actually legitimate whether or not the timing was actually a legitimate whether or not this president had the authority to do so considering the fact that he has not present the case for why this was an imminent threat so i dont think that this should have been that their statement been removed at all. No no no absolutely not and i feel this way even there was a discussion that we had a probably a few weeks ago about whether or not Donald Trumps twitter should be suspended in things like that you know i had i dont support censorship across the board and i think that that you know like i said theres a lot of information you know someone who actually follows whats going on i actually do know where iran is over there but this is one of those instances where i think there is an overweight. In government there appears to be an inconsistency because as we saw i think you know if twitter well twitter is just twitter its not going to do that so its really just facebook and instagram but i think this really is just an overreach and maybe theyre trying to align themselves with what they feel is its do us sanction and i understand like the u. S. Sanctions argument but most people dont understand that even if were journalists are in the process of delivering news especially in the region like iran i say no even even if that news lets say is against us Foreign Policy but we have a lot of news that is shared shared widely now that you know fake nudes or news that are supporting supportive of different regimes or even organizations that we may not like but i think that if were talking about a free press i think that we should just have it all out there yes you can you can turn away from it you dont actually have to watch it but i think this is just its going down a very very very thin line between that type of censorship and what were looking because weve seen these social Media Companies go after you know voices of opposition on both the left and the right over the past year which is really interesting and now theyre private businesses they have a right to decide who is or is not on their platform but it is interesting seeing this kind of play out like this i want to also has this this week President Trump tweeted in a long tweet but i want to pull this out of the usa is watching this you tweeted this to iran turn your internet back on and let your reporters room free