Over the past six months, Americans have become increasingly aware of automated license plate readers, used by almost 80 percent of American police departments to trace vehicles and their drivers without the hassle of a warrant.
asserted
Americans → become → warrant
ALPRs perch on power poles and stoplights, quietly encroaching on the most sacred silo of American life—the car.
asserted
ALPRs → perch → life
Like the slew of data centers cropping up across the country, the cameras have inspired fierce bipartisan backlash.
asserted
cameras → crop → backlash
As ALPRs proliferate, communities have pressured local lawmakers to rein them in, leading municipalities and counties nationwide to cancel contracts, remove the cameras, or ban them altogether.
asserted
communities → proliferate → them
Now, a surprising cross-section of candidates—local, national, liberal, conservative—are putting Flock at the heart of their campaigns.
asserted
section → put → campaigns
With 2026’s midterm elections fast approaching, both Republicans and Democrats in battleground states like Florida, Michigan, and Pennsylvania are wooing voters by promising to place guardrails on unregulated surveillance technologies.
asserted
Republicans → approach → technologies
Politicians of all stripes suddenly seem to think that they need to get Flock out of here.
asserted
they → seem → Flock
ALPR systems like Flock use algorithmically powered cameras to compile searchable databases of the license plate numbers, time, location, make, model, and color of passing cars.
asserted
systems → use → cars
Flock CEO Garret Langley claimed in March that his company’s cameras, which make up about 80 percent of the total mapped ALPR cameras in the US, “solved” one million crimes in 2025.
asserted
which → claim → 2025
(The available evidence doesn’t back up Langley’s numbers.)
asserted
evidence → back → numbers
Although police can, for example, use Flock cameras to try to track down a missing person or stolen car, reports also abound of cops using ALPRs to stalk their exes, track an abortion-seeker across state lines, and provide information to ICE.
asserted
cops → use → ICE
The lack of strict standards around their use—and concerns over the erosion of privacy and civil liberties—have become a major concern across party lines as communities debate if, and how, the tech should be used.
asserted
tech → become → lines
A September survey of more than 1,400 adults by the nonprofit National Policing Institute found that public approval of ALPRs depended on the justification: 80 percent approved of their use to find missing children or investigate violent crimes, but about three-fourths disagreed with using the cameras for immigration enforcement or “routine traffic or parking enforcement.”
asserted
fourths → find → enforcement
More than half said their support for the systems would increase if their department “adopted safeguards” against abuse.
asserted
department → say → abuse
With a month to go until a slew of intensely contested elections and public concern over Flock and its competitors only growing, congressional candidates and sitting legislators across the political spectrum are calling to rework the patchwork regulatory system that governs the cameras’ use.
asserted
that → go → use
And while Flock’s public relations efforts seem to be ramping up, they have brought few politicians to their side on either the right or the left.
asserted
they → seem → right
(A notable exception: Donald Trump, who has said “I like them” with regard to the cameras.)
asserted
I → say → cameras
While ALPRs have been around since the 1990s, 90 percent of people didn’t know whether their local police department used the technology in 2018, according to one poll; the new wave of public awareness and controversy around Flock and similar cameras has left politicians scrambling to catch up.
uncertain
wave → know → politicians
“Most jurisdictions don’t have clear regulation around the use of ALPRs,” said Clare Garvie, deputy director of technology law and policy at New York University’s Policing Project.
asserted
Garvie → have → Project
That provides an opening to politicians willing to promise regulation, outright bans, or just constraints on who gets to use them.
asserted
who → provide → them
100 percent of police departments serving more than one million residents use them, according to Bureau of Justice statistics, as do 90 percent of sheriffs’ offices with 500 or more sworn deputies.
uncertain
percent → serve → deputies
But that tide could be shifting: in the past year alone, more than 50 municipalities have cut ties with Flock and other ALPR vendors, according to the advocacy group DeFlock.
uncertain
municipalities → shift → group
“There’s been a widespread lack of transparency around where these tools are implemented, how widespread they are, how many actual cameras there are, [and] how long the data is kept,” Garvie added.
asserted
Garvie → implement → transparency
On September 23, a Senate committee led by Republican Josh Hawley of Missouri and Democrat Dick Durbin of Illinois—both of whom have staked out positions as anti-surveillance crusaders—held a hearing on ALPR reform.
asserted
both → lead → reform
They invited representatives from Flock, Axon, Motorola, and Verkada—but none of them showed.
asserted
none → invite → them
“We’ve got to find a way to protect and enforce the Bill of Rights and the basic personal liberties of every law-abiding citizen in this country, no matter what the technology is,” Hawley said at the time.
asserted
Hawley → get → time
A week later, the Missouri Republican announced plans to introduce the Stop Flock Act, which would prevent local governments from selling or sharing vehicle data with non-governmental third parties, limit data retention to ten days in most cases, and impose other restrictions on the cameras’ use.
asserted
which → announce → use
In fact, at least four different bills were introduced in Congress in September alone that would limit ALPR use.
asserted
that → introduce → use
By October 2, the text of yet another bill—this time from Democrats Bernie Sanders, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, and Jeff Merkley—was announced.
asserted
text → announce → Democrats
And after November’s elections, a new bipartisan batch of legislators could help push federal regulations on ALPRs forward.
uncertain
batch → help → ALPRs
Angie Nixon, Florida’s Democratic Senate nominee, has made “protect[ing] privacy and end[ing] mass surveillance” a core component of her campaign for a hotly contested election.
asserted
Nixon → make → election
Nixon proposes “federal standards,” requiring law enforcement officials to obtain a warrant before accessing ALPR data, imposing a mandatory data deletion period, and mandating community consent at the local level before ALPR contracts are signed or renewed, among other things.
asserted
contracts → propose → things
“I know folks are saying, ‘We’ve got to keep crime from happening,’” Nixon said in an interview with Mother Jones.
asserted
Nixon → know → Jones
“The way you keep crime from happening is by addressing the root cause of crime, which is oftentimes people not having access to quality, good-paying jobs or access to healthcare, just the most basic needs.
asserted
people → keep → healthcare
For one thing, they often misidentify vehicles—which can lead to devastating consequences, as in the case of Lindsey Isaacs, a Florida woman wrongfully jailed for 13 days on triple homicide charges after a Flock camera incorrectly flagged her Dodge Durango as the vehicle involved in a fatal hit-and-run.
asserted
camera → misidentify → hit
Even Florida’s Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis, whose policy positions couldn’t be further from Nixon’s, wants to tamp down on ALPRs: In early September, he banned the cameras on state highways.
asserted
he → want → highways
Nixon isn’t the only candidate campaigning on Flock.
asserted
Nixon → campaign → Flock
Another progressive Senate candidate fighting for a battleground seat, Michigan’s Abdul El-Sayed, has also raised alarms about ALPRs.
asserted
candidate → fight → ALPRs
In late August, El-Sayed released a video about Flock and his Republican opponent Mike Rogers’ alleged links to the booming surveillance state.
asserted
Sayed → release → state
While Rogers and El-Sayed have little in common on most issues, they’re now trying to outflank each other on Flock as communities across Michigan voice ire towards the cameras.
asserted
communities → have → cameras
…and 13 more, not listed.
The Aporia
