In a concerning development on the health of free speech in the United States, videos have shown FBI agents visiting citizens’ homes to interrogate them about “offensive” social media posts.
Two such videos are currently going viral on X, depicting people who identify themselves as federal agents to the shock of the residents.
One video takes place in Stillwater, Oklahoma, where two men and a woman knocked on the door of Rolla Abdeljawad’s home wanting to ask her some questions about posts she had made on social media. Abdeljawad recorded the incident on her phone and demanded identification. The agents responded saying they had already shown it to her and just wanted to talk.
Abdeljawad then indignantly said they will have to speak to her lawyer, to which the agents replied to have her attorney contact their office.
Disturbingly, the agents also said that Facebook had contacted them with screenshots of her account.
The video ends with the agents leaving and Abdeljawad making sure to record the tag of their vehicle as they drove away.
Although details are still being uncovered, according to some social media influencers, Abdeljawad had made a post wishing for the destruction of “Zionists” in Palestine.
FBI Actions:
People are now outraged on social media because the FBI went to the home of a Muslim woman named Rolla Abdeljawad and asked her about her Facebook posts. People questioned whether they were really FBI and then attacked these agents doing their jobs. Let’s clarify a… pic.twitter.com/QEoapjonOl
— Brian Krassenstein (@krassenstein) March 29, 2024
Nevertheless, apparently no specific or credible threat was made and the post is clearly from a woman with pro-Palestinian sympathies who is venting about the war and destruction in the Middle East, all in a social media vacuum that has an algorithm designed to show users more and more outrage-inducing content as they engage with it.
Surely, the FBI has much better things to do than to be investigating random citizens over angry posts on a rage-generating platform. It begs the question — did these agents just have a quota to fill and decide to harass normal people to get the job done and call it a day? Or is there something more calculated happening?
Another incident involved a woman named Kam St. Martin who posted a picture and name of a man who allegedly killed her cousin and was out on probation. The post said “may you reap what you have sown.” An FBI agent is recorded through a door camera coming to her residence to question her about the post.
While a post involving an alleged murder might catch the eye of investigators, the implied suggestion of the poster doing something wrong in using their free speech is alarming and seems to be a growing trend.
In fact, under the Biden administration, ordinary citizens have repeatedly been harassed and interrogated by federal agents for reasons as simple as showing their support for Donald Trump online.
Under Democratic leadership, we are seeing the rise of authoritarian federal law enforcement agencies backed by an authoritarian government, which in turn is in bed with pro-censorship social media companies and a politically complicit mainstream media — a troubling direction for democracy.
