“[F]rom now on,” US president Donald Trump wrote in his Truth Social temper tantrum over anti-ICE protests in Lose Angeles, “MASKS WILL NOT BE ALLOWED to be worn at protests.”

I agree with what Trump’s saying … but not with what he means.

He’s ordering protesters not to wear masks (they’ll ignore him, as they should).

He should be ordering the police and military personnel across from those protesters to uncover their faces.

Over the last several years, it’s become common to see photos and videos of supposed “law enforcement personnel” conducting operations while wearing balaclavas and other face coverings to hide their identities. Not just while working “crowd control” at demonstrations, but when busting into homes and businesses to investigate alleged crimes, serve warrants, etc.

That needs to end, now, for two reasons.

The first reason is that it’s unsafe for everyone involved.

Hypothetical:

You’re going about your lawful personal business when someone wearing a ski mask and dark jacket with large lettering on the back runs at you, waving a gun and yelling “Freeze! Police!” (or “ICE!” or “FBI!” or whatever).

Is he or she actually a police officer of some kind?

Or are you about to be mugged, raped, murdered, or some combination of those things?

If you weren’t conducting yourself violently at the moment of contact,  you’d have a solid “stand your ground” case if you whipped out a handgun and put that person down. Your fear of  death or grievous bodily harm in such a situation would be entirely reasonable.

If you weren’t conducting yourself violently at the moment of contact, the proper approach by a real police officer would be to politely introduce himself or herself, with face uncovered and service weapon holstered, produce photo identification matching said face, and state his or her business with you.

We’ve seen a recent spate of arrests for impersonating ICE agents and other “law enforcement personnel” while detaining and even raping others. Those incidents may or may not have involved masks, but letting real cops wear masks makes impersonating them easier — and their jobs harder if onlookers justifiably intervene versus unidentifiable masked assailants.

The second reason is about who owes what to whom.

As a private citizen, who you are and what you look like is none of the government’s business until and unless there’s probable cause to believe you’ve committed, or are in the act of committing, a crime.

As a government employee, who a cop is and what he or she looks like is entirely the public’s business any time we want it to be. The cop at least pretends to work for — “serve and protect” — us, while collecting a paycheck from the taxes we fork over.

We’re the bosses, at least in theory. They’re our employees, at least in theory.  The idea that they’re entitled to hide their identities from us while waving guns at us and ordering us around gets that relationship completely bass-ackward.

We shouldn’t have to show your faces. They should.

Thomas L. Knapp (X: @thomaslknapp | Bluesky: @knappster.bsky.social | Mastodon: @knappster) is director and senior news analyst at the William Lloyd Garrison Center for Libertarian Advocacy Journalism (thegarrisoncenter.org). He lives and works in north central Florida.

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