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The government's argument here is that if the agents knew they had to obtain a warrant to search the phone, they would have held the individual, or just their p

The government's argument here is that if the agents knew they had to obtain a warrant to search the phone, they would have held the individual, or just their phone, until they got the warrant and it would have been searched anyway. If they were unable to obtain a warrant then the phone's contents would be suppressed. While it's now clear that warrantless border searches of cell phones are illegal, the very fact that this took 4 years and had to go all the way up to the Supreme Court to determine this means there was ambiguity. It's not that the agents were "ignorant of the law", it's that the law was unclear on this aspect. If agents were just ignorant of well established law this never would have made it to the Supreme Court. And these decisions generally don't apply retroactively since it would be incredibly disruptive. For example, if they were retroactive then in states that have always had laws outlawing abortions on the books, abortion doctors could be charged for crimes after Dobbs v Jackson overruled Roe v Wade. (Previously, Roe v Wade nullified those state laws). Of course, I absolutely agree with your sentiment. It's absurd this was ambiguous in the first place and that it took this long to establish that these warrantless border phone searches were illegal.

ok_dad 3y ago
I get the technical aspects are complex, but it’s ridiculous to me that this argument is accepted, I don’t care what explanation there is, law enforcement won’t remember or care about some case that ended in their favor, but if the judge has set a hard line and suppressed the evidence, I bet law enforcers would get some training on this topic. We need to make laws less complex where our basic rights are concerned. It’s alright, maybe, to have complex corporate tax codes, but for the basic bill of rights subjects we need simplicity for the people to really understand their rights. Thanks for the good response by the way, I like that we can discuss this like adults!

ok_dad 3y ago

I get the technical aspects are complex, but it’s ridiculous to me that this argument is accepted, I don’t care what explanation there is, law enforcement won’t remember or care about some case that ended in their favor, but if the judge has set a hard line and suppressed the evidence, I bet law enforcers would get some training on this topic. We need to make laws less complex where our basic rights are concerned. It’s alright, maybe, to have complex corporate tax codes, but for the basic bill of rights subjects we need simplicity for the people to really understand their rights. Thanks for the good response by the way, I like that we can discuss this like adults!