OPINION:
California and New York are considered by the Democrats and their fellow travelers on the left as the perfect petri dishes with which to experiment with policy and legislation.
Whatever they do in these Democratic dumpster fires of states you can be sure it’s the beginning of a recipe they intend for everyone else. Want to know what the future under today’s Democrats would look like? All you need do is look at Los Angeles, San Francisco and New York City.
Right on cue in the midst of a crisis they have no intention of allowing to go to waste, the Democrats of New York have provided us with an actual example of fascism in the form of a bill called Assembly Bill 416. This bill allows the governor, or anyone he designates, to “remove” and detain anyone they choose in the name of public health.
The banal introduction of AB 416 simply describes it as: “Relates to the removal of cases, contacts and carriers of communicable diseases that are potentially dangerous to the public health.”
But it’s much more than that. Cases, contacts and carriers, you see, are people. This shocking piece of proposed legislation allows one or two people to forcibly remove a citizen from her home, perhaps even children, to any premises or location the governor chooses. A camp perhaps? This elimination of due process and torching of the Fourth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution would be triggered by that very same person, the governor, who would only have to declare a “health emergency due to an epidemic of any communicable disease.”
COVID-19 is not mentioned because this is about so much more than the current virus; this is about using the current fear and compliance of the public to usher in a completely unconstitutional law allowing one person to detain and imprison not just someone who is sick, but anyone who might be sick, people who have been near that person, and others who may potentially spread whatever disease, whether they have it right now or not.
Specifically, AB 416 reads, with my emphasis in bold and commentary in brackets:
“Upon determining by clear and convincing evidence [whatever that means] that the health of others is or may be endangered [what?] by a case, contact, or carrier, or suspected case, contact or carrier of a contagious disease that, in the opinion of the governor, after consultation with the commissioner [a bureaucrat], may pose as imminent and significant threat [Notice how they insert ’may pose’ to qualify this] to the public health resulting in severe morbidity or high mortality, the governor or his or her delegee, including but not limited to the commissioner of the heads of local health departments [’not limited to’ means it can be anyone on earth], may order the removal and/or detention [if not detained then removal to where?] of such a person or of a group of such person either by name or a reasonably specific description of the individuals or group being detained [oh like, ’all the Jews living on a certain block,’ or ’all the Blacks in a particular apartment building?’]. Such person or group of persons shall be detained in a medical facility or other appropriate facility or premises designated by the governor of his or her delegee … [in other words, wherever they want. Tent city? Camp? Prison?]”
There is no due process here. There is no court order. There is no warrant. You don’t even have to be infected with any known virus or contagion; they can say they suspect you of having whatever it is they declare. The flu perhaps? Some other virus? Who knows, and if the “why” won’t be relevant at all.
But it doesn’t end there. The target(s) will then be subject to medical procedures without their consent. They will be required to take a “prescribed course of treatment, preventive medication, or vaccination, including directly observed therapy to treat the disease,” or even forced to undergo “decontamination” procedures.
Assemblyman N. Nick Perry, a Democrat and the author of this garbage, has been in office since 1993. He knows what he’s doing. Mr. Perry, a Black man born in Jamaica, is an American citizen. One would presume he is familiar with the obscenity of the 1932 Tuskegee experiments by the U.S. government. For over 40 years, African-American men were experimented upon without their knowledge by the U.S. Public Health Service, a part of Health and Human Services. It only came to an end when a whistleblower revealed the research to a reporter in 1972.
This is part of our history which understandably makes many Americans, especially those in the Black community, suspicious of the intentions of the federal government as it relates to vaccines and treatment. It was an event which reminds us of what big, bureaucratic and disconnected government is capable.
This 21st-century proposed New York legislation indicates certain imperative lessons have not been learned and does not engender trust in the intentions of government as we continue the imperative fight against COVID-19 with vaccines and other treatment.
Mr. Perry told Fox News that none of what this bill proposes would violate anyone’s constitutional rights. That is absurdly not true. He should re-familiarize himself with at least the Fourth Amendment, and also the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments. Mr. Perry did not go rogue; he’s an “elder statesman” of Albany. What happens in New York and California are tests of what the Democrats plan for the entire country. Nothing is a lark, or a singularly bad idea; this, like everything they do, is a goal. It’s only a matter of implementation.
• Tammy Bruce, president of Independent Women’s Voice, author and Fox News contributor, is a radio talk-show host.
Please read our comment policy before commenting.