DHS has already gathered my background info, for example. I filled in the forms, surrendered my fingerprints, sat for a lengthy interview. All of this is now on file. Now, suppose California is dropped from the Roster of the Blest between now and 2023, when in the normal course of affairs I will be up for renewal. It is unlikely that I will have had any dealings with the DMV by then—my (federally compliant!) license will not expire until a couple of years after that, and even the auto registration is in the spousette’s name and not my own—so there will be no new information to be had by then. But if Trump is still president, and if California has joined his punitive shitlist, no Global Entry for me. Well, yeah, First World problems.

And consider this: if you drop the former category of “Trusted Travelers” into the general TSA mix, it makes a bigger pool in which the bad fishies may swim, and arguably makes the process less secure, rather than more. But of course, it’s not about “security” for the short-fingered vulgarian and his tame thugs, it’s about “owning the libs”:

“There will be no curiosity, no enjoyment of the process of life. All competing pleasures will be destroyed. But always—do not forget this, Winston—always there will be the intoxication of power, constantly increasing and constantly growing subtler. Always, at every moment, there will be the thrill of victory, the sensation of trampling on an enemy who is helpless.”