1. United States
2. Md.
3. Letter

Block ICE's planned $20 million no-bid contract to purchase electric shock gloves before it is finalized. DHS is rushing to outfit ICE officers with the G.L.O.V.E. device — a glove that delivers painful electric shocks at the press of a hidden button — with a solicitation that could drop as early as this Friday. This is not a legitimate law enforcement tool. It is a force multiplier designed to inflict pain on people during civil immigration enforcement, where no criminal charge has even been filed. The ACLU has already flagged that ICE spent the last year showing it is too quick to use force. Now a private company, Compliant Technologies LLC, stands to collect tens of millions in taxpayer dollars selling devices that can be activated invisibly, with no warning to the person being shocked. Even the manufacturer warns against using them on children, pregnant women, elderly people, and disabled individuals — exactly the populations ICE regularly encounters. There is no reason to trust that those restrictions will be honored. Use every tool available to halt this contract, demand full congressional oversight, and cut off any funding that would allow ICE to deploy these devices in the field.