Exclusive: PowerPoint Shows Drone Industry’s Lobbying Plan To Expand Over Domestic, Law Enforcement Markets

By posted Feb 15th 2012 at 10:15AM

Drones are mainly associated with the Predator airships that patrol the Afghanistan sky. But thanks to a bipartisan vote last week, the public can expect 30,000 domestic drones flying over the United States in the next eight years.

The dramatic change in policy, which has raised concerns with everyone from civil liberties groups like the ACLU and Electronic Frontier Foundation to the pilot association and the Independent Institute, as well as conservative think tanks, occurred thanks to an aggressive and well-organized effort by drone makers and their lobbyists.

Yesterday, we reported how the Association for Unmanned Vehicle Systems International (AUVS), a drone trade group, actually doubled its recent lobbying expenses. Today, we report on a PowerPoint presentation put together by top AUVS lobbyists Michael Toscano, Mario Mairena, and Ben Gielow. The lobby group — which maintains an official partnership in Congress with Reps. Buck McKeon (R-CA), Henry Cuellar (D-TX), and dozens of other lawmakers — was the driving force behind the domestic drone decision passed last week. In the presentation obtained by Republic Report, there are several fascinating concerns raised by the lobbyists:

– Page 5: Drone lobbyists claimed access to airspace and “Global Conflict – particularly U.S. and allied nation involvement in future conflicts” will “either positively or negatively” influence “market growth” for the industry.

– Page 6: The drone lobbyists take full credit for authoring the expansion of domestic drone use codified in the FAA authorization bill passed last week, noting “the only changes made to the UAS section of the House FAA bill were made at the request of AUVSI. Our suggestions were often taken word-for-word.”

– Pages 10-12: The drone industry eagerly anticipates that civil drone use, including use of drones for “suspect tracking” by law enforcement, will soon eclipse military use of drones. Under a section called “Challenges facing UAS,” the lobbyists listed “Civil Liberties.”

View the presentation below:

 

Drone Lobby Presentation

View more presentations from lhfang.

 

 

Filed Under Lobbying 

Comments

  • Deborah Newell Tornello

    Lee, you are fantastic for bringing this to the fore. I don’t think people realize how pernicious the whole security-state-creep is. Or how unconstitutional it is, in so many cases, to spy on law-abiding citizens. And how paranoid, wrong, expensive, and flat-out violative it is.

    • Anonymous

      Thanks Deborah!

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  • http://cxj2.myopenid.com/ Ola Nordmann

    That second sentence “the public can expect 30,000 domestic drones flying…” could also be changed to “the public can expect to BUY 30,000 domestic drones…” since the taxpayer is going to foot the bill for enriching the corporations who make them.

    As a private pilot I strenuously object as well. It’s challenging enough to See-and-Avoid passenger-capable aircraft, as well as fly clear of all the numerous (and increasing) restricted airspaces, without having thousands of relatively tiny drones flying about erratically. How are they going to avoid endangering other aircraft or people on the ground? I’m a techie with an engineering background, so I have a good grasp on how these drones work — and it isn’t good enough to make me feel comfortable as a pilot or citizen.

    And those concerns are in addition to the police-state-creep and the expense.

    • http://entitledtoanopinion.wordpress.com TGGP

      I don’t know if you read John Robb’s Global Guerrilla’s, but a lot of DIY folks are also into drones. Some anti-hunting activists attempted to use a drone to film a shoot a few weeks back, and somebody (presumably upset at the event’s cancellation) shot it down, making it the first drone casualty in the U.S.

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  • http://twitter.com/cypherinfo G. Calamita

    When there is a period when everywhere you see and listen to something about the same topic I wonder why? This article is the aswer.

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  • RheinSiren

    Thanks Lee, you’re my civil liberties hero for writing this piece. Now I’m going to be sick.

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  • http://entitledtoanopinion.wordpress.com TGGP

    ““Global Conflict – particularly U.S. and allied nation involvement in future conflicts” will “either positively or negatively” influence “market growth” for the industry”

    Wow, way to be real specific. Wouldn’t want to go out on a limb and make a falsifiable (or informative) statement.

  • Michael Kenney

    It’s hard to imagine that the public would be accepting of this if knowledge of it was really widespread. I’m sure law enforcement will claim this is a boon, but what about the potential for abuse? This gives me the creeps. The fact that a corporation (definition: an organization designed to maximize individual profit while minimizing individual responsibility) will profit from it is doubly disturbing, since history shows that corporate profits tend to trump civil liberties time and time again.

  • Trodtaylor

    Some people act like the only problem with this picture is that they will have to pay for the drones will be payed for with their tax money. These (so called) libertarian idiots have more money than sense. Do you people have any principles other than a desire to not pay taxes? Wake up from your selfishness

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  • Lmatthes47

    While it is true that a drone can be equipped to fly spy missions, as can a manned aircraft, care must be taken to avoid restricting their use in dealing with civilian emergencies. It was identified a few years back that three CQ10A unmanned aerial vehicles could have provided communications immediately following the Katrina disaster. So called drones, a term that goes back to before WWII to identify unmanned flying targets for gunnery practice, can be used for fighting fires, for research, for reaching places that for various reasons are unreachable by road, and numerous other beneficial civilian uses.

    It is also true that they can have “embarrassing incidents” as can manned aircraft.

    Legislation making it illegal to use a UAV to invade US citizens privacy is critical, but banning UAVs is foolish.

    Lloyd R. Matthes

  • Snowbearbird

    The term creep for big brother’s database is relative to the speed of light.
    My life experience includes outrage everytime I encounter the abuse (unlawfull use) of the information gathered unlawfully
    and used by anyone with access to said database.
    Being 71 years as a U.S. citizen I find my concern more toward my great grand children and thier children.
    - – so – NO – to another creeeep of big brother’s database. Our judicial system must and was designed to regulate the
    misuse of this sort of law enforment tool. My hope is that we the people will purge and reclaim our judicial system soon.

  • AnonymousCoward

    I wonder if this was someone’s solution to border patrols. I’d be fine with this if there were details in law that stated that the use of UAV technology required a federal and state warrant for a specific use. It would then be a matter of public record how they were being used. Or for border patrol restrict the airspace of these devices to a narrow range from the perimeter of the country. I’m not surprised this is happening and nothing will stop it. Might as well take helicopters away from law enforcement if one thinks this can be supressed. It’s just too good to be true for all sorts of agencies. Every law enforcement agency out there will just have to have one.

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