It's no secret that the current U.S. regime views a sizeable portion of its own civilian citizens as enemy combatants. They are already shooting people in the face and not even putting up a pretense of acting shocked at the act. Historically, it is easier to win elections than revolutions; limiting access to game-changing technology puts the power advantage even more firmly in the corner of the regime.
https://chicago.suntimes.com/news/2025/10/02/faa-drone-zone-...
I picked up an older DJI model in December and am super glad I did with recent events.
[0] https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/ng-interactive/2026/jan/...
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_deaths_in_ICE_detentio...
"violence" covers more than just murder, and there's plenty of ICE violence to go around.
The DJI ban is about China, not domestic protests.
It can be about both.
Two birds, one stone.
If it was just about China they would not be turning TikTok, CBS into right wing platforms. They would not be announcing intent to violate 4th Amendment and go door to door without warrants.
Trump doesn't actually care about China. He prays on idiots fears with xenophobia. Trump is Palpatine. He's afraid of losing power. See also Steve Bannon at CPAC going on about how, if Dems win midterms a lot of them are going to prison.
They need to make moves to also protect their troops: https://www.thedailybeast.com/dhs-ice-hated-under-donald-tru...
Occam's Razor suggests it's not 12D chess they're playing. Just boring biological self selection. Someone in meeting brought up risk to them from drones.
Was working in EE designing motherboards for telco when manufacturing was offshored. It was plainly described as protectionism. Fear Americans with such skills could threaten Intel or copyright cartels. Educated and capable Americans capable of being manifold people who do not kowtow readily to political memes are greatly feared by the generation in charge. They've been working for years to maintain the historical narrative that serves.
Control the imports of technology to control the economy.
I am sharing my genuine opinions and perspectives. I assume you are as well. Let's keep it civil.
As for tiktok/etc, I don't think that has much of anything to do with ICE and has a lot more to do with squelching legitimate anti-zionist speech. That said, it does plausibly have a lot more to do with domestic protests than a DJI drone ban, which is hardly a blanket ban on drones, and really will do next to nothing to stop people from using drones over/with/for protests. By the way, the DJI ban went through the House and Senate with bipartisan support, during Biden's presidency:
https://dronedj.com/2024/06/14/dji-ban-passes-the-house-and-...
In either case, it should go before a jury.
You like this? What is wrong with you?
Tell me more about how humans are criminals for existing? You hate the idea of someone standing on your piece of dirt without your express say-so that your preference is to live under an umbrella of fear and suspicion of your neighbors?
Forgive me, this is not how I want to live. I wonder how many Norwegians who settled in Minnesota were illegal immigrants?
This seems like a troll?
You can do it by following the rules non-violently.
Trump/Right, enjoy seeing people in pain. That's the problem, the methods and glee in seeing the pain.
Overall it is probably better for the world society in general that pretense is gone and the realpolitics is laid bare. The risks are no longer ambiguous but real and clearly stated and the world can plan mitigation accordingly.
America has always been at its best when it lives up to its ideals, and at its worst when it discards those ideals. America has often been in the wrong, but on balance, the world has been better off for having a great champion of liberal democracy.
With Trump, it's not a question of believing things that are right or wrong. For the post-truth mindset, right and wrong don't matter. Democracy doesn't matter. There is only power. The second Trump presidency is the first time in modern history that America is no longer a great nation.
The push into Iraq to remove Hussein was an effort to gain control over the oil and gas production in Iraq. It was favored by the domestic oil and gas industry here in the US and once we had boots on the ground in Afghanistan after Sept 11 and Bush&Co began making noise about Iraq and WoMD, the industry began digging up old geological and geophysical studies of the region to build interest and knowledge base domestically so that once our troops had control of the production areas domestic operators could move in to handle production. Industry publications had adverts for old Iraq datasets and services related to it before any invasion happened. Maybe they were just hedging their bets you say. Yeah, right. It was always about oil and gas in Iraq. They just needed to remove the thorn in their side and install a compliant government.
When there was a large scale genocide in Bangladesh by Pakistan, US not only implicitly supported Pakistan, but also attempted to block/attack India (not clear the intentions, but Soviets got involved). There are many such cases.
For rest of the world to believe that US has only best intentions, they have to be really naive. In case Saddam, would US have the same enthusiasm for democracy if it was not for oil? US has toppled democratic governments when they were not aligned to its interest.
To put it in personal terms, would anyone trust someone with their money to person who only cheats 70% of times, while is honest 30% of times? The conclusion to be had is that those in incidents of honesty aligned with the interests of the person. Not because he or she was actually a good person.
This is a perspective that continues to boggle my mind.
Every record of the United States acting internationally has been either:
Explicitly horrific (Invasion of Grenada, Vietnam, Firebombing then nuking Tokyo, Iraq etc…)
Attempts to Subvert or ignore international law (IPCC, ICC, UN…)
Or benefits some major industrial corporation (NAFTA, WTO etc…)
Please point to any type of transcendent “morality or rules” that isn’t just straight up large scale international realpolitik and propaganda around maintaining global capitalism on behalf of American based owners.
The word pretense to me means “we’re gonna actually try this and let’s see how it goes”
The United States has literally never done that and we know that because internal documentations for pretty much anything always have some kind of American benefit Nexus it is not based on any type of foundational belief that transcends the concept of “we’re gonna do whatever the people who are the loudest owners of the political system of the United States want to do”
Everything else including: Powell going to the UN with a vile full of rice is just straight up unabashed unequivocal propaganda
an attempt to make something that is not the case appear true. E.g. "his anger is masked by a pretence that all is well"
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Agency_for_Inter...
Like all large organizations and projects they are not absolutely perfect or ethical, as you can see in the Concerns and criticism section towards the bottom of the Wikipedia page. Still, I think they made some contribution to humanity. I have seen articles saying the withdrawal of funding has definitely hurt communities USAID had been helping.
I know the CDC (Centers for Disease Control) do (or did) disease prevention work outside the US. There are other examples like these. I don’t know if the government did more good than bad, but they certainly have done some good that is not just designed to benefit American big capitalists.
Federal laws about data collection and retention, export, and algorithmic usage… as well as laws about software update channels for hardware devices, eg requiring that it be possible to replace firmware yourself… all sorts of regulations could be put in place that leave the software and hardware markets open, by making it clear where the boundaries are. If DJI or TikTok are doing something bad, prosecute and fine them and enjoin them from doing it again… but make it clear what specific behavior you have a problem with.
checks notes
software privacy than political disobedience
“The officer has a reasonable belief that the subject of such force poses an imminent danger of death or serious physical injury to the officer or to another person”, and someone gunning an SUV at you is imminent danger.
> She sees he is there, puts it in drive, and pulls forward.
The fact that her steering was cranked to the right is proof enough that she was not intending on hitting him.
Graham V Connor: “The calculus of reasonableness must embody allowance for the fact that police officers are often forced to make split-second judgments—in circumstances that are tense, uncertain, and rapidly evolving.”
It’s wild to think you can drive towards a Fed, inches from your bumper, and not get shot because “you weren’t intending to hit him”.
You also have to ask why Renee Good decided to leave her wife behind who tried to get in the locked passenger door. Another agent was grabbing the driver door and reaching his hand inside. What was Mr. Ross doing with his free hand? He was holding his phone in the other hand to video the encounter for some reason, even though they're supposed to have body cams.
There's no way a judge or jury looks at this and thinks the agents involved followed proper training.
Unless that vehicle is an imminent deadly threat to the officer or others, which this officer reasonably believed.
>LE is trained not to put themselves in front or back of the vehicle, since you can get run over that way.
That’s a tactic, not policy - and again, which is it: Renee isn’t going to run someone over, so he can stand there, or she is going to run someone over, so he shouldn’t stand there?
>Agent Jonathan Ross did not follow his training, despite being dragged by a vehicle months earlier.
Past incidents do not legally compel an officer to act differently in the moment. Just as how getting dragged in the past doesn’t further justify his shooting, it also doesn’t mean he should’ve done anything differently.
>You also have to ask why Renee Good decided to leave her wife behind who tried to get in the locked passenger door. Another agent was grabbing the driver door and reaching his hand inside.
Yes, that further depicts her actions as reckless, chaotic, and contributes to the perception of her driving being dangerous flight, rather than casually driving away.
>There's no way a judge or jury looks at this and thinks the agents involved followed proper training.
Training is not the legal standard, “objective reasonableness” is. An officer could (and did) reasonably believe that a woman obstructing ICE, fleeing an interaction with such haste that she left her passenger, and driving forward with him at the front bumper is in imminent danger of being struck by the SUV.
There are numerous OIS involving people in vehicles and cops on foot, and they consistently are cleared, even when the officer is in a less dangerous position than the Minnesota scenario.
I've been in situations like that in Walmart parking lots, where a car jolts forward and I have to jump out of the way, and maybe I say "That crazy bitch just tried to kill me" but while saying that I understand it to be a hyperbolic albeit justified anger at reckless driving, and that nobody was actually trying to kill me, and shooting the driver in the face instead of diving out of the way would be a suboptimal survival strategy even if homicidal intent was there.
As per a sibling comment:
> The bad apples metaphor originated as a warning of the corrupting influence of one corrupt or sinful person on a group: that "one bad apple can spoil the barrel". Over time the concept has been used to describe the opposite situation, where "a few bad apples" should not be seen as representative of the rest of their group. This latter version is often used in the context of police misconduct.
> The bad apples metaphor originates from the proverb "A rotten apple quickly infects its neighbor", first recorded as used in English in 1340.[1]
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bad_apples
* https://www.merriam-webster.com/wordplay/one-bad-apple-spoil...
And the real problem is that the highest levels of government is defending the actions of the bad-apple cop.
It is the fact that these crazy high quotas that ICE agents must meet are a high-level government policy that are 'forcing' the agents to do these crazy things (if they want to keep their jobs); of course some ICE thugs enjoy doing this and like the power trip(s).
You could pick endless words and sayings in English from 1000 years ago, which are entirely different now.
So what?
The modern usage is quite clear.
Perhaps it is "clear", but it may have lost the lesson of the original adage. Perhaps that lesson is worth knowing.
If we're speaking about the same incident, there was no mistake. it was intentional. there has been no apology from any official source, as one would expect in the case of a tragic mistake.
Just an example: "Vance said the ICE officer was clearly justified in shooting Good. The officer was clearly acting in self-defense, Vance said. He framed Good as "a victim of left-wing ideology" who was spurred by an alleged network of politically motivated groups to interfere with law enforcement."
https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/watch-live-vance-joins...
Do you have any citations for that? Jonathon Ross's entire chain of command including Sec of DHS and the President has justified the killing in multiple public statements. There has not been any official admission that it was a mistake, tragic nor description of Jonathan Ross as a "bad" apple or anything.
When have Trump's administration ever suggested it was either? So far they have said:
-it was an act of self-defense by Ross
-Ms. Good ran over Ross
-Ross has immunity even if he committed murder
-Ms. Good was very disrespectful to law enforcement
> You can't take one tragic mistake or bad-apple cop and draw conclusions about the fate of the country from it.
It was not bad apple. It was logical conclusion of ICE tactic and strategy. They also kidnap people, beat them up, throw them out somewhere else on the street. They throw tear gas into insides of cars or just randomly as bye package to citizens. They intentionally ram cars and cause traffic accidents.
Also, concretely, the lower level ICE members have seen to:
1.) do stuff like pointing a gun at a woman and saying "you did not learned from it".
2.) Destroyed memorial of the killed woman.
3.) Been heard to say she was "fucking bitch".
It was not bad apple. He is their hero and exactly where their tactic will go.
This is officially sanctioned domestic terrorism against the citizens of Minnesota and no American should stand for it.
When huge stories hit, and HN is overloaded, browing while logged out is the way to get through.
On the other hand, little drones are effectively munitions now. That means drone manufacturing capacity is effectively munitions manufacturing capacity. We're giving potential adversaries economies of scale building things that may be used to kill us.
I'm generally a pretty free market guy but the war in Ukraine has changed some things. My main complaint with this law is that it is so US focused; I'd be fine with drones built in Europe or Japan or other allied nations.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Democratic_backsliding_in_the_...
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2021/04/how-stop-m...
Even if they were considered arms for the purpose of 2a this isn’t a ban on drones but a specific manufacturer. They government can definitely refuse to grant a manufacturer license to sell on this country.
https://azaoinc.com/shop/ols/products/rpg-heat-round-destruc...
That's not to say there aren't some legal hoops to jump through.
No I need to go to a flea market for that.
It's not a specific manufacturer; it will impact US-made drones too, and based on how it's being rolled out is intended to shut down decent quality, inexpensive and easily-acquired drown sales - exactly what say, a journalist might want.
The fact you can drive a 26,000 lb GVWR truck without any special license is something special we have in America compared to most of say, Europe. It's actually pretty mind blowing anyone can just rent 26 ft diesel 26,000 lb truck and get in and drive it on the highway.
It is testament to the fact there are a few vestiges of freedom left in America. Not much, but a few vestiges, since such trucks were around before the regulation hysteria of the late 20th century and 21st century.
He incited an insurrection last time he had power, in a desperate attempt to stay in power. Congress impeached him for it, but spineless Republicans refused to convict him for it. Then when he got power again, he pardoned everyone who took part in the insurrection. He's talked about having a 3rd term, so if you think he's just going to go away at the end of this term, you are mistaken.
We have a very healthy FPV community here in the states perfectly capable of building drones from parts just like Ukraine is doing.
People can just record all this stuff on their iPhones that they already have. You don’t need a DJI drone to record police malfeasance. Maybe you do in China or Iran though. In Iran they are just mowing people down. In China you get disappeared. Interesting that there are no protests about those things though. I guess they just have better social media marketing.
its very useful reporting updates about when the water will be back at full capacity.
America is helping Russia with its invasion of Ukraine.
Even as recently as this past week the United States Navy has tracked down and seized Russian "shadow fleet" tankers which are operating despite American and European sanctions, and did so with Russian naval vessels nearby and despite strong protests and anger from Moscow. Hopefully Europe can step up its game and do so too.
But do you know who is helping Russia besides China? India. Iran, South America (Brazil, &c.), plenty of other countries. They've given no money, no aid, and are all too happy to buy illicit Russian oil.
I'm inclined to think Ukraine is fighting our war for us.
The 1980s Cold Warriors would've been flabbergasted at how cheap taking out the Russian military at the knees would wind up being.
The price tag you quote is the same as the "an $X value thrown in for free" you see in "deals" from shady companies.
Furthermore, the weapons had a cost when they were new, and replacing them now carries a higher cost.
Saying the price tag is fictional is like saying my dinner is free because the steak was already in my fridge.
B) Ironic that you say some people have no ability to see the wider perspective while falling for the broken window fallacy of economics.
> The price tag you quote is the same as the "an $X value thrown in for free" you see in "deals" from shady companies.
So I don't think this is very accurate. Unless you want to suggest that funding, equipment, and more given under the Biden Administration, never mind US actions like sanctions, are the product of "shady deals".
Is there a war we needed to fight with Russia in this decade, the next decade, or the last, and if so, is Ukraine even damaging the parts that matter?
Russia nukes hold America at threat, not a bunch of conscripts and some old BMPs. America isn’t safer if Ukraine scores another 100K Russian casualties, and there’s even an argument that a destabilized, volatilized Russia would be more dangerous for America.
Europe is safer though, so there's that at least. Russia can't invade the United States of course, but it can invade other countries in Europe, and it is actively taking action to do so.
Drones are not going away in the US, they will just not be made by their primary political adversary. Let's not be hyperbolic, the US is nowhere close to having a revolution or civil War. People need to stop getting their primary world view from doom scrolling instagram or reddit.
The language of the goverment has shifted to "war" such as:
• DHS New Year's Eve launch of the $100M "wartime recruitment" campaign.
• Ads portray joining as a "sacred duty" to "defend the homeland" from "foreign invaders," using war-like imagery such as Uncle Sam posters and action movie-style videos.
Other factors:
• The several lies from the administration about the shooting of Renee Good, such as that the shooter was run over and is recovering in the hostpital, besides the actual shooting itself.
• Minneapolis has thousands of volunteers for rapid response teams to show up wherever ICE shows us.
• The biggest No Kings protests ranged from 5-7million.
Recent lawsuits:
• January 12, 2026, Mark Kelley vs. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, the Department of Defense, and the Navy.
• Minnesota AG Ellison et al. v. DHS/ICE (Jan 12, 2026): State, Minneapolis, and St. Paul sue over "Operation Metro Surge," alleging unconstitutional raids, excessive force, and viewpoint discrimination; seeks restraining order.
• Illinois AG Raoul & Chicago v. DHS/ICE/CBP (Jan 12, 2026): Challenges violent tactics like tear gas use, warrantless detentions, and targeting sensitive locations; seeks prohibitions on enforcement practices
I wouldn't say the US is "nowhere close"
I've been saying it for ages, but a decent easily available western equivalent to the ESP32 (meaning easy WiFi) needs to happen, and until it does there will be a giant hole in the middle of the entire maker universe, which increasingly acts as the prototyping stage for commercialized gadgetry.
They exist, they just don't ship to individual nobodies without NDAs and months of talks and supply commitments, therefore we might as well consider them nonexistent. And that's sinking the whole world into oblivion, and no one(sane) is doing anything about it.
Chinese equivalents of Western products ship same day to mail drops at two digits below USD denominated global market manufacturing costs. That's their secret sauce. Or tried and true East Asian miracles strategy, of exploiting material independence to vacuum in foreign currency that are short of cost but are just trustless bundles of paper anyway. Economic competition is not possible when that's possible for them and nobody else - NOBODY else, not like "only for Asian backwater whatever failed state", but China, for now, specifically.
I'm actually from Japan and, with goggles of a maker on, DJI behavior feels reminiscent of Sony until it sank. The tech is top notch, and prices make progressively less sense towards higher ends. That kills competitions by denying sales of high end products(IMO. I'm not a sane person).
An ESP32 can, for the most part, be fully audited in what it is sending. Yes, the wireless drivers are binary blobs, but the developer has extensive control over the device, and it is easy to monitor/filter/firewall the data sent.
3D printers, as a general category, are also more similar to the ESP32 than to DJI.
At first I found it hard to believe that this is data they wouldn't get more reliably, more extensively from a satellite. But then I imagine, if you were a bad actor, you wouldn't want all the video, all the exact terrain data, etc, but maybe only that near certain points of interest like energy infrastructure, transportation, etc. So this, paired with satellite data is super powerful.
Then again, for most of the US, Google street view exists so there's that, a lot of the data is already out there.
This is not about recreating google maps data. The US banning DJI drones is really a necessity at this point. It's not a complete solution to the problems at hand, but there is no point in supporting China in this way.
I feel like blocking DJI is just politics of “we have have to do something, anything” and “hey look, we did things” even though those things are irrelevant.
- Texas Instruments SimpleLink CC32xx (CC3220 / CC3235)
- TI CC3235MODA module
- Renesas DA16200
- Microchip PIC32MZ-W1
- Microchip WFI32 module family
- Silicon Labs SiWx917 / SiWG917
- Silicon Labs SiWx917Y module
- Nordic Semiconductor nRF7001/7002 WiFi 6 IC
- Use with nRF52, nRF53 or nRF91 series SoCs
- STMicroelectronics STM32 with ST67W series pre-certified WiFi modules
If necessary one can use any cheap hobby solution for initial development and then port to an industrial-class SoC solution. We've done this a few times during pandemic era shortages; using the RP2040 to get through prototyping and development and then switching the design to an industrial-grade chip.
The TI parts seem a bit expensive in small quantities, but the Microchip and SiliLabs parts are like $6-7 in single units from Digi-Key. Is it just that the dev kits are in the >$50 price range which puts people off compared to ESP32?
It helps to separate hobbyist use from professional product development.
The hobby market is driven by quick, cheap, and easy: low up-front cost, abundant tutorials, and inexpensive dev boards. In that context, ESP32 shines, and expensive dev kits can be a real psychological barrier.
For commercial, industrial, or professional products, however, small-quantity pricing is often irrelevant. Sample or single-unit prices rarely reflect real production costs. Without getting into specifics, it’s common for the ratio between sample pricing and volume pricing to be 10× or more.
A part that costs $20 in onesies can easily be a $2 part at scale. This doesn’t apply universally, but it does mean that judging a device’s suitability for mass production based on Digi-Key single-unit pricing is usually a mistake.
There are also system-level considerations beyond the MCU’s line item price. For example, the RP2040 could be very inexpensive (around $0.50 in modest volumes when we used it), but that ignores the required external flash, which adds cost, board space, and supply-chain complexity. More importantly for many products, it offers no meaningful code security (the external flash can simply be read out—which can be a non-starter in commercial designs).
Guaranteed long-term availability can be crucially important as well; with design support requirements in commercial/industrial settings often extending past ten year timelines.
Tooling and ecosystem maturity also matter. At the time, the RP2040 toolchain was notably hostile to Windows, and Raspberry Pi support reflected that attitude. In reality, most product development (EE, MCAD, manufacturing, test, PLM/ERP) is Windows-centric. Asking an organization to bolt a Linux-only toolchain onto an otherwise Windows-based workflow just to save a dollar on an MCU is rarely a winning argument.
So while cost absolutely matters, it’s often not the dominant factor in professional design. Security, tooling, vendor support, long-term availability, and integration into existing workflows frequently outweigh a few dollars of MCU price, particularly once production pricing enters the picture.
Translation: they're expensive, and getting them working involves jumping through hoops more complex than simply getting boards off Amazon and launching VS Code. They aren't equivalent, and the sneering isn't helping.
It is failing to understand this that opens the door to DJI and Bambu, who unsurprisingly prioritize user experience and predictability, which is a major factor in why in open competition they keep wiping the floor with everyone.
Not allowing _any_ foreign made components, however, is insane, as is not even auditing DJI when they didn't put up a fight. They have to know they're just killing the small drone industry completely.
Checks out. More legislation boosts your business.
The drone thing is a personal opinion. If the US ends up in a war (whether it’s one I agree with or not, likely not), I don’t want millions of drones to be remote controllable by the folks we’re fighting.
How will it even get out of my closet to create such havoc for 26 minutes before it drops out of the sky begging me for a new battery?
There is no real downsides for the current gov’t here.
I’d pay more for domestic parts, because I think the capability is strategically valuable, and the quality of Chinese stuff is super variable.
There’s basically no industry here because the aliexpress parts are so cheap, so I support some protectionism, understanding that it will make the hobby more expensive.
I think you’re probably right, but I think going for million dollar drones from anduril while wiping the rest of the market is a miscalculation.
Chinese stuff ranges from cheap to expensive, super reliable and super unreliable, too.
I can’t even think of another country that makes 4S Lipo batteries or the motors or the ESC’s or the VTX or the GPS module..
So are Molotov’s.
The impact is more for bind and fly drones that are FCC approved so you don’t need a HAM license to operate them.
To me it also looks like there are also loopholes you could drive a truck through in terms of importing partially assembled drones that can be assembled by the end user as well as approving components by making their use not exclusive to UAS.
What actually happens remains to be seen because it really depends on what the enforcement actually looks like and how well work arounds work.
I think the real goal of the regulators is to ensure an onshore supply chain for government use and there won’t be a focus on civilian usage.
It's too fast with no viable replacement path in sight.
Classic trump administration. Do something splashy, then when the media hype dies there is a giant void and no plan whatsoever
Yeah, with parts from China...but that's banned too.
Homegrown factories and supply chains don't just pop up overnight though. So in the near term this just means zero drones and a disorderly transition.
Intentionally triggering that only really makes sense if you think a major confrontation is imminent and chaos is an acceptable price to pay to force speed.
We're not talking about duct-taping a Go Pro to an OTS drone.
So while not duct-taping a GoPro (we'd use Gaff tape anyways), they could use bailing wire with a grenade or c4 bundle to attach it.
DJI drones aren't being used as weapons platforms in the US...
They're being used for industry (agriculture, real estate, land surveillance, fire monitoring)
No one gives a shit that it's not difficult to make a flying grenade. They care that all the features you're in here mouthing off about as "not important" are actually important.
Plus, if we're talking military drones vs civilian drones, they wouldn't need plastic shells. That'd just be more weight reducing distance. Then again, military industrial complex would probably try to make them stealth capable, be designed by committee from 22 nation states, be micro-USB mandated to comply with EU standards, blah blah. Yeah, you're right, we'd never be able to build them here.
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43073808
It's not necessarily better than 6 inches. But it's pretty decent, down to 0.3m, roughly 12 inches.
> even if they could do better I would question the utility of higher resolution data for anything military related.
Oh boy. Suffice to say that it definitely is useful for many things military related.
Can you give a single example?
> "People flying DJI drones are mapping the US"
Some might call that poor pre-planning. If you're about to go to war with your biggest supplier, you'd be well advised to stock up on supplies before firing the first shot.
"All you need to do to defeat the US is completely destroy its entire industrial base"
Even going off your theory that the US drone industry is not easily sabotaged, it can't possibly be easier to sabotage the US drone industry plus all the import pathways (which you would otherwise have to re-establish). That is why you chose this dismissive fake-quote rather than address what I've said.
Of course I am rather dismissive of the claim that this is a small feat. I accuse you of not fully thinking through what exactly it would take to fubar domestic drone production.
The problem is that it would be extremely risky for a US company to spin up a comparable US built drone. Even if they can match the price/quality point, at any given time the government could remove the ban, killing the entire business model.
[1]: https://www.reuters.com/world/china/us-commerce-department-d...
https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2026/01/supreme-court-ta...
> DJI responded publicly that month that they had nothing to hide, and subsequently spent a year trying to convince the U.S. government to begin the audit. But no federal agency even began
There's your answer. There was never any concern over Americans data being sent to China.
Also they didn't "Follow through", they simply let the clock run out without even evaluating DJI's reponse to the claims.
It’s plausible that the determination was made that there were backdoors/spy equipment/whatever in the products, so no audit or smooth talking from corp representatives would make a difference in this case, given the supply chain remains controlled by an adversary. If you don’t trust that an audit can be executed with integrity then there’s not much point in conducting one at all.
The fact that this has been extended to all foreign drones does make that feel like more of a political statement though, or at the very least the original intent is being hijacked for political theater.
0. https://www.cisa.gov/news-events/cybersecurity-advisories/aa...
> Huawei has a history of IP theft and security incidents related to backdoors and malware going back nearly 20 years.
> ZTE has been accused of including unusual backdoors in some products and was caught selling equipment containing U.S. technology to Iran and North Korea, in violation of trade agreements. … Security researchers, however, noted that the backdoors were “highly unusual” and appeared intentional because they were supporting software updates.
Source: https://www.congress.gov/117/meeting/house/112475/documents/...
The problem is the software updates. Whoever controls those keys has an entire domestic fleet a single firmware update away. Probably won't even be DJI, but some either state or non-state hacker that happens to acquire the update keys.
https://www.nbcnews.com/business/business-news/drone-company...
https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1956955/000168316824...
https://theintercept.com/2025/07/28/donald-trump-jr-son-dron...
They could get us to ban DJI for sure but I'd assume it'd be more through carrot than stick, because at this point we've been pretty consistently beaten for the last year.
Incorrect. General tariffs are only on goods not already covered by CUSMA, which, other than the specific items already called out (aluminum, steel, etc.), is a very small set.
Canada being the only country to successfully invade the US
or did I mix up my pronoun references again?
* https://www.nbcnews.com/business/business-news/drone-company...
* https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2024/nov/27/donald-trump...
Also, from 2025:
> In October, Popular Information reported that the Pentagon awarded a contract to Unusual Machines, an obscure drone company that President Trump’s son, Donald Trump Jr., joined as an advisor in November 2024, despite having no notable experience with drones or military contracting.
[…]
> Now, another small startup funded by 1789 Capital, a venture capital firm where Trump Jr. is a partner, will receive a $620 million loan from the Defense Department, the Financial Times reported. Vulcan Elements, which currently has around 30 employees, produces rare-earth magnets, which can be used in “drones, radar systems and other military applications.” The contract was awarded just three months after 1789 invested in Vulcan.
* https://popular.info/p/update-trump-jr-backed-startup-receiv...
The outcome of who can lawfully create and deploy eyes in the sky is the ultimate decider of the matter of who watches the watchers.
The stakes are significant.
Not to mention the targeted ad potential.
... the import of any foreign made drone parts is also blocked. This includes things like ESCs and flight controllers. Not just items that actually transmit radio signals like camera modules and so are traditionally regulated by the FCC re: import.
The best coverage of the FCCs over-reach attempting to regulate all parts, and then their subsequent very tiny walking of it back is Joshua Bardwell's video: https://youtu.be/Dyr87--SDuc (9m47s)
Almost all the new exceptions are for government users. The only thing relevant to human persons is the back-stepping change that as long as the components of a drone are 60% made in the USA the entire thing can be considered domestic and imported. Or US retail importers can take the risk of saying that a tx'ing camera module has alternate uses, like as a security camera, and try importing it regardless of the ban.
"FCC Updates Covered List to Exempt Certain Drones and Releases FAQs" https://www.fcc.gov/document/fcc-updates-covered-list-exempt...
As every foreign-made drone is now on the FCC’s “Covered List.