Rep. Keith Self (R-Texas), a member of the House Foreign Affairs Committee and a retired Army lieutenant colonel, issued a sweeping warning on X on July 23, 2026, tying together four separate government programs he says are collectively eroding what remains of Americans’ privacy. Self’s post read in full: “FISA. Flock cameras. Kill switches. Central Bank Digital Currencies (CBDCs). If Congress fails to address these abuses, Americans will no longer enjoy any form of privacy. The Fourth Amendment is NOT optional. Dismantle the surveillance state.”
Unlike a single-issue complaint, Self’s statement frames privacy erosion as a systemic problem spanning intelligence law, physical camera networks, vehicle technology and monetary policy — four fronts he has been actively working on in Congress well before this latest post.
A Recurring Theme From Self
The July 23 post was not an isolated remark. Six weeks earlier, in a June 3, 2026, opinion piece for the Daily Caller, Self laid out nearly the same argument at length, writing that “it should shock every American that the United States now ranks among the world’s most heavily surveilled nations — keeping dangerous company with authoritarian regimes like China, Russia, and Iran.” He wrote that the Founders “designed the Bill of Rights as a fortress against government intrusion” and argued that mass surveillance has been “normalized” since the September 11 terrorist attacks. In that piece, Self identified what he called the “four main pillars of the surveillance state” — the same four issues later condensed into his July 23 post — and closed with a call to action nearly identical in substance: “Reform FISA with a warrant requirement. Repeal the car kill switch mandate. Ban CBDC forever. Dismantle the surveillance grid. Protect the Fourth Amendment. Do it now — before freedom is lost forever.”
Flock Cameras in Self’s Own District
Self’s opposition to Flock’s automated license plate reader network is not abstract for his constituents. In the same Daily Caller piece, he noted that “Flock Safety’s automated license plate reader cameras now blanket communities in 49 states, scanning license plates billions of times per month,” adding that “in my own Texas Third Congressional District, more than 500 of these cameras are already deployed, with cities planning to add more.”
That local concern translated into legislative action. On July 15, 2026, Self introduced the Protecting Rights in Video and Equipment Acquired Discovery Act — the PRIVACY Act — with Reps. Eli Crane, R-Ariz., and Andrew Clyde, R-Ga., as cosponsors. The bill would require federal law enforcement agencies to obtain a warrant before accessing or querying data collected by automatic license plate reader systems like Flock’s, and would limit retention of that data to 30 days unless it is tied to an active prosecution or court order. Self told the Daily Caller News Foundation the measure was designed specifically to close the gap that allows federal agencies to obtain Flock data without the same warrant requirements that would apply to a traditional search.
What Flock Cameras Do
Flock Safety, founded in 2017, operates the country’s largest network of automatic license plate readers, now used by more than 5,000 law enforcement agencies nationwide. The cameras photograph passing vehicles and log their plate numbers, location, direction of travel and timestamp, feeding that information into a searchable, interconnected database. More than three-quarters of agencies using the system opt in to share their data with Flock’s live national database, according to information the company provided to the office of Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., meaning police in one state can search vehicle location records gathered by cameras in another without a warrant. NBC News has reported the network now logs approximately 20 billion vehicle scans per month.
The FISA Fight
Self’s objection to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act centers on Section 702, a provision originally intended to allow intelligence agencies to monitor foreign targets but which critics say has increasingly swept up Americans’ communications for searches without a warrant. In a June 2026 op-ed co-authored with Sen. Rick Scott, R-Fla., and Rep. Andy Harris, R-Md., Self argued that FISA “has decomposed into a modern incarnation of the general warrants and writs of assistance that ignited our American Revolution,” created as a foreign intelligence tool but now functioning as “a domestic surveillance machine: sweeping up Americans’ communications, hiding behind secret courts and treating the Fourth Amendment like a roadblock instead of the supreme law of the land.” The three lawmakers called for Congress to reject a “clean,” unreformed reauthorization of Section 702 and instead impose a warrant requirement, pointing to acknowledgment from former Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Mark Warner, D-Va., that the domestic surveillance infrastructure needs fixing.
Vehicle “Kill Switches”
Self has also aligned with a group of House conservatives opposing a federal mandate, tied to the 2021 infrastructure law, requiring new vehicles to include technology that can detect driver impairment and limit or prevent the car from operating. Rep. Chip Roy, R-Texas, who has led the legislative push against the mandate, has introduced amendments to strip the requirement from federal law, backed by Self along with Reps. Thomas Massie, R-Ky., and Scott Perry, R-Pa. Self told the Daily Signal, “The government should never have the ability to remotely kill your car or anything else you own.” Roy has separately called the mandate “a direct threat to our Fourth Amendment rights” that could enable government monitoring of Americans through their vehicles.
Central Bank Digital Currency
The fourth issue in Self’s post, central bank digital currency, has been a sustained legislative priority for him in 2026. In December 2025, Self filed an amendment to the roughly $900 billion National Defense Authorization Act that he branded the “Anti-CBDC Surveillance State” measure, which would have barred the Federal Reserve from testing, developing or issuing any form of a Fed-backed digital currency, including one operating “under any other name or label.” The push followed a 2025 executive order from President Donald Trump halting federal work on a CBDC; Self and allied conservatives sought a statutory ban that a future administration could not as easily reverse, citing fears that a government-controlled digital currency could be used to monitor or restrict Americans’ financial transactions in a manner similar to systems used in China.
Self’s push hit resistance during final NDAA negotiations. According to reporting on his subsequent X posts, Self accused House leadership of breaking a promise to include the anti-CBDC language in the final bill, writing that conservatives had been assured the provision would be included but “instead, we’ve been handed a take-it-or-leave-it bill that breaks that promise.” Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., separately said she would “not support any system that lets the government cut off Americans from their own money.” A related anti-CBDC measure from Rep. Tom Emmer, R-Minn., was ultimately included in the final package instead of Self’s version.
A Consistent Voting Record on Privacy
Self’s July 23 statement is consistent with a broader voting pattern since he took office in January 2023. A member of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, where he serves on the Europe and South and Central Asia subcommittees, Self also sits on the House Committee on Science, Space, and Technology and the House Committee on Veterans’ Affairs. According to GovTrack’s analysis of his legislative record, national security and international affairs make up the majority of the bills he has sponsored, reflecting a lawmaker who has repeatedly framed privacy and surveillance issues through the lens of constitutional limits on federal power.
Military Background Informs His Framing
Self, a 1975 graduate of the United States Military Academy at West Point who served in the U.S. Army from 1975 to 2003, including with Army Ranger units, has often framed his opposition to expanding government surveillance powers in terms of the constitutional oath he took as a military officer. Before coming to Congress, he served as Collin County Judge in Texas from 2007 to 2018. His campaign website describes him as someone who will “fight all efforts by the left to curtail our Constitutional rights,” a framing consistent with the language he used in both his June op-ed and his July 23 post.
Coordination With Other Lawmakers
Self’s warning echoes concerns raised by other members of Congress in 2026, including Rep. Scott Perry, R-Pa., who has separately and repeatedly called for Congress to “STOP THE FLOCK” after reporting confirmed the network logs approximately 20 billion vehicle scans monthly. Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., has raised similar alarms from across the aisle, writing to Flock’s CEO that the company has provided database access to Customs and Border Protection, Homeland Security Investigations, the Secret Service and the Navy’s Criminal Investigative Service, and recommending that communities “reevaluate” their Flock contracts. Self reposted a message from Perry reading “DEFLOCK AMERICA. END THE SURVEILLANCE STATE,” reflecting ongoing coordination among House members pursuing parallel legislative fixes on the issue.
What Comes Next
With his PRIVACY Act introduced in mid-July and his NDAA anti-CBDC push having stalled in December, Self’s July 23 post signals an intent to keep all four issues — FISA, Flock, kill switches and CBDCs — linked together as a single legislative priority rather than pursuing them separately. Congress faces recurring deadlines on FISA Section 702 reauthorization and ongoing appropriations and infrastructure legislation where the kill switch mandate could resurface, giving Self and allied lawmakers repeated opportunities to press the case he outlined in his post: that without action, “Americans will no longer enjoy any form of privacy.”