Man Faces a Proposed $13 Million Fine for Racist Robocalls, U.S. Says. The Federal Communications Commission said the intent of the robocalls was to “cause harm” with more than 6,000 such calls in six states.

New York Times ^ | January 30, 2020 | Neil Vigdor

[karpov]

A man who telecom regulators say was apparently behind a barrage of racist robocalls in six states — sowing hate in response to the killing of an Iowa college student by an undocumented immigrant and a white supremacist’s murder trial in Virginia — is facing a proposed fine of nearly $13 million by the Federal Communications Commission.

The man, Scott D. Rhodes, who anti-hate groups say is a white supremacist and runs the website Road to Power, was “apparently” responsible for more than 6,000 robocalls in 2018 “with the intent to cause harm,” the F.C.C. said on Thursday.

The commission said that in addition to Iowa and Virginia, Mr. Rhodes targeted people in California, Georgia, Florida and Idaho with the robocalls.

Most recently, Road to Power took credit for a flurry of racist robocalls made to Columbia University employees after Tessa Majors, a Barnard College freshman, was killed in a mugging in December in New York City. The calls, which promoted a white supremacist ideology, were not part of the F.C.C. action on Thursday.

The F.C.C. said it traced 827 spoofed robocalls that were made to residents in Brooklyn, Iowa, in August 2018 after the slaying of the University of Iowa student, Mollie Tibbetts, by an undocumented farmworker from Mexico. Ms. Tibbetts, whose murder has been invoked by President Trump in his push for a border wall, was from the small town.

The commission said Mr. Rhodes used an online calling platform to intentionally manipulate caller ID information to display local phone numbers as the source of the calls. That practice, known as neighbor spoofing, violates the Truth in Caller ID Act, the commission said.

[aimhigh]

Amazing how quickly they can trace and shut down robo calls when they want to.

[stuck_in_new_orleans]

They go after robocallers. This nutjob just happens to also be racist

[catnipman]

what about non-racist robocalls? could we please fine the shite out of the scum that do those as well?

[CharlesWayneCT]

The key here is not that his message was vile, but that he broke the law by spoofing the phone numbers; I presume any robo-caller who does this COULD be prosecuted for it.

[CharlesWayneCT]

Every day now I get one or two, always from new phone numbers, telling me about irregular activity on my social security account, for which I need to call them back.

[Do_Tar]

> ...But I would probably be charged for terrorist threats instead.

Use the defense of
Sudden
Hysterical
Intermittent
Turrets
Syndrome.

[Scrambler Bob]

Maybe you mean Tourette’s

But yes, these calls do invoke SH....Syndrome.