Blocked by a Nation
The tiny text in the corner of his phone’s screen read “2:37am”. Everyone else in his apartment building had long been asleep, but he was stuck awake reading through the president’s latest rant.
@POTUS_CONNOR: The FAKE NEWS is saying the polls are down! WRONG! They are the hiest theyve ever been, everyone knows it. I talked to a man today, a REAL patriot, tears in his eyes, he said “Sir, you are doing the most tremendous job in history.” TREMENDOUS!
James had already unfollowed the president long ago. He took a lot of pride in curating his social media feed with positive things that inspired him, like train station photography and raccoon videos. And yet the algorithm always found a way to shove these posts in his face. It was like a digital hydra. It would come in the form of a quote-post, a trending hashtag, a suggested follow, or a screenshot. The Digital Allegiance Act ensured that the president’s posts were always visible, impossible for someone to escape it.
@POTUS_CONNOR: They want to take away your freedom, your pride, your NATION! They hate me because they hate YOU! Sad! I will NEVER let them. We are bilding the greatest economy and the GREATEST military and anyone who says othrwse is a traitor to this country!!! #AmericaFirst
James blinked a few times, his physical weariness fighting with the blue light glowing in his face. He no longer felt exhausted by the politics, but the endless volume of it all. It was like a firehose of noise and typos. While he could handle these things during the day, the onslaught in his quiet apartment at night felt like being invaded by a needy ghost. Spot, his elderly beagle, snored softly on the couch, oblivious to the chaos in the digital world.
All he wanted was peace.
He decided to go for the nuclear option. His thumb tapped on the little three dots next to the president’s name then found the menu item he was looking for: Block @POTUS_CONNOR.
A confirmation box appeared asking if he was sure. He was. The president’s profile picture disappeared along with the post, replaced by a gray silhouette.
There was a newfound peace in the room. He took a long and deep breath and felt the tension in his shoulders melt away. For the first time in many months, he felt at peace. He put his phone on his nightstand and closed his eyes.
Kyle was the first to notice. From his office... actually it was a cubby subdivided in a basement of the White House, the IT department received an automated alert that a user had blocked the president’s account. He was working late that night, something he was happy to do as a loyal acolyte in the church of America First. He had been waiting for the moment to demonstrate his devotion to the cause.
He immediately ran a script to identify the user. He saw it was an unverified user to had just initiated a hard block. The man’s name was James Goodman, a 34-year-old violinist from Columbus. Kyle’s heart pounded as he started to pull in intelligence from various databases, getting an increasingly clear picture of this man.
While there was no history of mental illness or criminal activity, this deliberate act was to Kyle like spitting on a cross. His supervisor, a close confidant of the president, had once said that protecting the president on social media was as important, if not more so, than what secret security did for his physical security.
Kyle had to act. He quickly summarized James’s personal information into a memo to send up the chain of command. He used alarmist language, calling James a potential threat to national unity.
The next morning, as the sun began its journey over the White House, this memo flowed from the intern to the press secretary. From there it was passed along to the president’s chief of staff along with a dozen additional sub-memos and reports which all painted James as an excessively dangerous threat to the entire country.
The chief had a pile of memos, with that one top, as he entered the Oval Office for the daily briefing. The president was already in a rage, stabbing his phone with his thumbs as he typed a new post while saying it out loud.
“Their ratings are in the toilet because they are LOSERS and HACKS!” the president wheezed. “Tell them they’re a dying network!”
The press secretary looked over at the chief of staff with a look of relief. At least she would no longer be alone in this room. The chief of staff cleared his throat and waited for the rage to ebb before he raised his voice. “Mr. President, I think it’s time for the daily briefing.”
“Hmm? Already? I was just about to post something really fiery,” the president boasted. “But let’s get this over with.”
“Okay, the first item is... well it’s not too important. A memo from the digital team. Someone blocked your account last night.”
“And who would do such a thing?” the president’s eyes narrowed.
“We have identified the user. He’s just some guy. Let’s move on to the next item,” the chief of staff said, trying to downplay the situation.
“No, wait. We can’t let this go. You can’t block the president. It’s... it’s unconstitutional! It’s anti-American!”
“Sir, I’m not sure...”
“Give me their name! I demand to know who is betraying our country!”
The president’s neck turned a dark red. The bad polling numbers and media coverage had put him in a bad mood, but this singular act of defiance seemed to be far more personal, the last straw. The president, to some degree, relished attention positive and negative. Someone opting to ignore him was the ultimate insult.
“James... Goodman... From Columbus.”
“Get the Attorney General in here! Now!” the president bellowed as he smashed his fist against the desk.
The Attorney General, a plump and sweaty man named Robert, scurried into the office a few minutes later.
“Sir? I heard from the Chief of Staff you needed an urgent meeting with me?” Robert asked slowly, noticing the president’s red face.
“Robert, there is a traitor, some nobody who has blocked my posts. They no longer can see what I have to say! I need you to do something about this. Make an example of them! Ruin them!”
“Mr. President, I can understand why you’re mad, but there’s no law against blocking someone,” the AG was flabbergasted.
“I’m not asking to find a law! Take care of it!” the president screamed. “The Digital Allegiance Act. Or sedition! Treason! Either you come up with a reason, or I’ll find someone with a more creative legal mind! I want him GONE! So find a reason! Find one!”
The Attorney General swallowed hard and fled the room, leaving the president to fest in his rage. He knew the president was not going to forget about this, and he had to come up with some sort of response. He delegated this task to his most ambitious, and most morally flexible, lawyers from the Digital Sedition Task Force. They had to figure out how to punish a person for something as simple as blocking a social media account.
Those lawyers worked hard on this project for weeks, reading through scores of legal precedents and twisting them as far as they could bend. They found statutes from World War I about pledging allegiance to the flag. They looked at the broad surveillance authorities granted by the Digital Allegiance Act.
Finally, they developed a legal theory for which ‘novel’ was an understatement. The president was not merely a person. He was the living embodiment of the executive branch. He spoke on behalf of the entire country. To willfully disconnect from this voice was not a personal choice. It was a de facto renunciation of the duties of citizenship. It was an implicit act of renouncing one’s allegiance to the country. Not only was this act treason, it was an act of self-denaturalization.
James was unaware of all of this. He had spent his nights performing and his mornings quietly gardening with a coffee nearby. He had reached a new level of serenity.
One late afternoon, as he felt the sun’s warmth on his back, he heard a sharp knock from his front door. Spot started barking, disturbed from his nap. James stood up and put his book, a mystery novel in paperback, down on the table. He wasn’t expecting anybody. He walked over to the door and peered through the peephole.
He saw two people in dark suits on his porch. A man and a woman. Both wore sunglasses and had stoic expressions. They looked like FBI, but why?
He opened the door slowly and greeted them. “Can I help you?”
“You are James Goodman.”
A chill ran down his spine. She was looking for him, and she wasn’t asking.
“We’re from the Department of Justice,” the man held a thick manila envelope in his hand. “This is for you.”
James took the envelope slowly, realizing his hands were trembling. he swallowed hard and he undid the seal. The document inside was full of dense legalese. He skimmed through it quickly, trying to quickly understand it while the agents watched.
“Pursuant to the... Digital Allegiance Act... based on established acts of civic alienation, the United States Department of Justice, on behalf of the President of the United States, has petitioned the court for the permanent revocation of the natural-born citizenship of James Goodman, effective immediately. This is to be followed by deportation proceedings.”
“Deportation? But I’m an American citizen. I was born here! I’d be stateless... where would I go?”
They didn’t answer his question. They turned around and returned to their inconspicuous black sedan parked on the street. James didn’t know what to do next. He didn’t even know why this was happening. All he could do was look at the document in his hands and struggle to make sense of the situation.