He's more than welcome to voice his desire to have them surveiled. Just as I can voice that he would make an awful public official or officer with that attitude.

> Last I checked, we lived in a democracy.

The United States is a Constitutional Republic with rights explicitly enshrined therein, including its amendments. You are more than welcome to your opinion on violating constitutional rights but if you want the rule of law then you should follow the constitutional process to add an amendment in order to revoke said rights.

> So, you are opposed to government surveillance of neo-nazi groups that eschew violence, then?

Yes! You either believe in free speech and freedom of assembly or you don't. If these groups are a clear and present danger, show probable cause already. If they aren't, counter-protest, shame them, embarrass them, whatever.

More often than not, hate groups can't help but cross that line to violence or are already linked to violence. It's really almost an oxymoron to talk about neo-Nazi groups that "eschew violence" since they almost always believe in genocide and the violent overthrow of the government and are working towards it. I know it's a tempting rhetorical device, but it's really a strawman.

> The United States is a Constitutional Republic with rights explicitly enshrined therein, including its amendments. You are more than welcome to your opinion on violating constitutional rights but if you want the rule of law then you should follow the constitutional process to add an amendment in order to revoke said rights.

Tell me: which constitutional rights are violated by the police reading your public twitter feed?

> Yes! You either believe in free speech and freedom of assembly or you don't. If these groups are a clear and present danger, show probable cause already. If they aren't, counter-protest, shame them, embarrass them, whatever.

And how are you supposed to obtain probable cause, if you cannot even read people's public twitter feeds? Can you read their public websites? Their leaflets? What kind of research exactly is the FBI allowed to do on these groups?

It's the chilling effect[1] of both mass, pervasive and targeted surveillance.

This has a specific legal definition which is complex and not going to be communicated in a hackernews comment, but if you want to dig deeper,

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chilling_effect

Pro tip: pretend like your free speech is out of favor with the current extremist government.

Oppose tyranny.

That's exactly what i'm doing. I understand chilling effects. I don't see how reading public Twitter feeds cause them in a way we should be worried about.