Paul CantrellFeb 22

❝ICE officers are paid a bonus every time they detain someone.❞

Read that. Reread that. Internalize it. Map that back to every story you’ve heard of ICE agents going off the rails, every random kidnapping, every brutal and stupid ICE story.

❝“Individual ICE agents get money per head that they detain – the guards told me that.”❞

🧵

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/feb/21/karen-newton-valid-visa-detained-ice

‘Don’t go to the US – not with Trump in charge’: the UK tourist with a valid visa detained by ICE for six weeks

Karen Newton was in America on the trip of a lifetime when she was shackled, transported and held for weeks on end. With tourism to the US under increasing strain, she says, ‘If it can happen to me, it can happen to anyone’

The Guardian
Show threadYayaver

@inthehands

Let me narrate you Cobra Effect:

The Problem: During the British Raj, the government was concerned about the high number of venomous cobras in Delhi.

The Incentive: To reduce the population, officials offered a cash reward for every dead cobra brought to them.

The Backfire: Entrepreneurial residents began breeding cobras specifically to kill them and claim the reward.

Feb 23 at 6:08amWeb
Show threadYayaverFeb 23

@inthehands

The Outcome: When authorities discovered the breeding scheme, they terminated the reward program. Consequently, the breeders released their worthless snakes into the city, increasing the total cobra population.

The "Cobra Effect" now represents any situation where an incentive designed to solve a problem actually makes it worse.