Flock Safety camera legislation is dividing Congress along unexpected lines, and President Donald Trump has now placed himself firmly on the side of law enforcement, telling reporters aboard Air Force One that he ‘sort of like[s]’ automated licence plate readers (ALPRs) ‘because of law enforcement.’
The remark, made during a press gaggle on Sunday, followed a more equivocal answer Trump gave last month in the Oval Office, where he said the technology was ‘being studied’ and that his administration would share its views ‘over the next couple of weeks.’ Sunday’s answer had the character of a settled instinct rather than a policy conclusion.
Flock Safety Camera Legislation Advances in Congress
Trump’s endorsement arrives at a moment of unusual cross-party pressure on the ALPR industry. On Tuesday, Reps. Raja Krishnamoorthi (D-IL) and Michael Cloud (R-TX) introduced the No Federal License-Plate Observation and Camera Keeping Act (No FLOCK Act). Under the bill, states must restrict ALPR use to five permitted purposes: toll enforcement, identifying stolen vehicles, locating missing or endangered persons, identifying vehicles linked to individuals with felony warrants, and investigating vehicles involved in felony offences. States that fail to comply would lose 10 percent of federal surface transportation funding apportioned under Section 104(b) of Title 23, with the penalty beginning in October 2028 if the bill passes.
A separate measure, the Flock-Off Act (H.R. 10221), introduced by Rep. Thomas Massie (R-KY) and co-introduced by Rep. Eric Burlison (R-MO), would go further. The snippet describing the bill attributed co-sponsorship to Rep. Ro Khanna; the official Massie press release names Burlison. Under the Flock-Off Act, federal funds could not be used to purchase, install, maintain, operate, or upgrade ALPRs or biometric surveillance cameras, and state and local entities receiving federal funds would have 180 days to cease operating covered systems. The prohibition extends to contracts, cloud services, and data-sharing arrangements. Two narrow exceptions permit cameras deployed within one mile of the northern or southern border to detect unlawful entry, human trafficking, or drug smuggling, and ALPRs used solely for toll collection.
The political backdrop for Massie’s bill includes a cancelled Flock pilot programme in Newport, Kentucky, where residents raised privacy concerns at a town hall on 14 July, and a wave of vandalism incidents targeting Flock cameras in Massie’s home state. The legislative push has now reached the Senate: Senator Josh Hawley (R-MO) announced on 30 September 2026 that he would introduce Senate legislation establishing guardrails for ALPRs.
The scale of existing ALPR deployment, and its problems, help explain the legislative momentum. According to reporting on the congressional debate, at least 149 cities and counties have already rejected or deactivated Flock Safety camera systems, and 26 states have no ALPR-specific statutes whatsoever. No state fully meets the seven privacy safeguards recommended by NYU’s Policing Project. A 2024 California police analysis found that Flock Safety’s system misread licence plates in 71 percent of alerts, raising concerns about wrongful stops. A Washington Post investigation, cited by Cybernews, found that at least 69 police officials have been accused, charged with, or convicted of abusing Flock or other ALPR systems. Public opinion has shifted accordingly: polling cited in Reason found that support for ALPR technology fell from 45 percent to 38 percent over roughly a year, while opposition rose from 33 percent to 46 percent.
A Pattern of Supporting Unchecked Police Power
Trump’s comment fits a long-established pattern. In 2016 he advocated rolling out stop-and-frisk policing nationally, describing New York City’s experience with the tactic as ‘incredibly well.’ A federal court had found the programme unconstitutional in 2014, ruling that it violated both the Fourth and Fourteenth Amendments; after it ended, crime fell rather than rose. In a July 2017 speech, Trump told police officers, ‘please don’t be too nice’ when arresting suspects, and suggested officers need not protect a detainee’s head when placing them in a police vehicle. At a 2024 campaign event he said police must be allowed to act ‘extraordinarily rough,’ adding, ‘One rough hour, and I mean real rough, the word will get out, and it will end immediately.’
Trump’s attitude towards the Central Park Five provides the starkest illustration of his instincts. In 1989 he took out full-page advertisements in four New York City newspapers calling for the execution of five teenagers, then aged 14 to 16, convicted of beating and raping a jogger. They had confessed after lengthy police interrogations conducted without a solicitor or parent present; no physical evidence tied them to the crime. Each served between six and 13 years before being exonerated after convicted rapist Matias Reyes confessed in 2002 to committing the assault alone, confirmed by DNA evidence. The five men filed a $250 million federal civil rights lawsuit in 2003, which the city contested for more than a decade before agreeing a $41 million settlement approved by a federal judge. Korey Wise, the oldest and the one who served the longest sentence, received $12.25 million; the other four each received $7.125 million, equating to approximately $1 million per year of wrongful imprisonment.
Trump has continued to insist on their guilt. At the 2024 presidential debate he stated they ‘pled guilty’ and that the victim had been ‘killed.’ None pleaded guilty, and the victim is alive.
Whether Congress can turn bipartisan unease into enacted law is the question now. The No FLOCK Act’s funding penalty would not bite until October 2028, giving states time to legislate, but giving opponents time to lobby. A president who regards ALPR misidentifications and officer abuses as acceptable costs of ‘law enforcement’ is unlikely to sign either bill.
