OPINION:
A House resolution from Illinois Democrat Rep. Bobby Rush that would put Big Government in charge of tracking citizens’ movements as they relate to COVID-19 mitigation efforts — even sending health bureaucrats to “individuals’ residences,” “as necessary,” as the legislation states — has a most apt number: 6666.
Mark of the beast. Mark of the beast for a beastly, monstrously unconstitutional bill.
After all, what’s more devilishly un-American than launching one of the most massive government surveillance programs of private citizens in U.S. history, all under the guise of protecting people from the coronavirus?
That’s the “COVID-19 Testing, Reaching, And Contacting Everyone (TRACE) Act” in all its $100 billion grant giveaway glory.
According to H.R. 6666’s text: The taxpayer funds will be used to “trace and monitor the contacts of infected individuals, and to support the quarantine of such contacts, through mobile health units and, as necessary … at [citizens’] residences.”
That means government comes to your home, taps on your door and demands you take a COVID-19 test. And if you test positive, that means the government makes sure you stay at home. How? Good question. Good unanswered question. Good chillingly unclear question.
The top dogs at the Health and Human Services and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention are in control of disbursing the $100 billion to local governments to carry out the COVID-19 testing — more specifically, to “hire, train, compensate and pay the expenses of individuals” to staff mobile health units and to knock on citizens’ doors and to enforce compliance with quarantining.
It’s all for the good of the country, dontcha know.
“Reopening our economy and getting back to normal will be all but impossible if we do not step up our testing efforts and implement robust and widespread contact tracing,” Rush said in a statement on his House webpage. “The COVID-19 TRACE Act will allow us to do this by creating a $100 billion grant program for local organizations to hire, train and pay individuals and to purchase supplies to run mobile testing units and door-to-door outreach as is safe and necessary.”
Be afraid; be very afraid. The resolution has dozens of cosponsors.
This is nothing but a massive government surveillance program cloaked in a cure-the-coronavirus label.
A petition at Change.org to stop the nonsense has generated about 28,000 signatures. That’s pitifully low.
“HR 6666 violates inalienable rights to one’s person, home and property, to one’s life, freedoms, privacy and security,” the petition states. “It is a violation of the Fourth Amendment, as well as the First, Fifth, Eighth and Ninth amendments … It is an illegal act of forced medical treatment upon We the People and an invasion into our local communities … [it] grants the [feds] broad authority as to empower any ’entity’ … to hunt down people with no reasonable suspicion of threat to public health … HR 6666 is unconstitutional, unacceptable and unlawful.”
Devilishly so.
H.R. 6666 takes COVID-19, the disease caused by the new coronavirus, and turns it into a mass surveillance authority for government against society.
And it does it deceptively so, under the guise of providing a societal good. Be not fooled: As 2 Corinthians warns, “even Satan disguises himself as an angel of light.”
This resolution, in America, has no right to see the light of day.
• Cheryl Chumley can be reached at cchumley@washingtontimes.com or on Twitter, @ckchumley. Listen to her podcast “Bold and Blunt” by clicking HERE. And never miss her column; subscribe to her newsletter by clicking HERE.
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