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September 7, 2023

Liberty Safe is only too willing to work with the FBI

By Andrea Widburg

Liberty Safe produces residential and commercial gun safes, not just under its own name but also under the labels Cabela’s, Remington, and John Deere. For years, people buying the product were concerned about pragmatic things: a safe’s price, ability to hold their weapons, and resistance to theft. What they didn’t realize, though, was that Liberty Safe would hand over access codes the moment the FBI came a-knockin’ at safe owners’ doors. But that is exactly what it will do, and by its own admission, too.

Last week, Nathan Hughes was the most recent person to find the FBI on his doorstep based on allegations regarding January 6. (The FBI, while disinterested in BLM and Antifa riots, or the attack on the White House, or domestic crime, is determined to destroy anyone who was within a two-state radius of the White House on January 6.) I have no idea what Hughes is alleged to have done regarding January 6, but I do know what Liberty Safe did last week.

Image: Liberty Safe logo, fair use for editorial purposes

The Hodge Twins were the first to describe what happened: the FBI arrived at Hughes’s Fayetteville, Arkansas, home, arrested him at gunpoint, turned off his security cameras and internet, and tossed his house, including his gun safe:

Hughes later confirmed that Liberty Safe handed over information allowing the FBI to open his safe:

That report set off a furor. I saw the Hodge Twins’ tweet when it first appeared and decided to hold my fire until I learned whether the FBI presented Liberty Safe with a warrant allowing agents to open the safe. Liberty Safe responded that there was a warrant…except when you read the fine print, you learn that it was a warrant to search the house, not to open the safe:

If you can read Liberty Safe’s tweet, the pertinent language says, “Our company protocol is to provide access codes to law enforcement if a warrant grants them access to the property.” That’s a far cry from a warrant granting them access to a safe.

Also, what kind of a safe company is it that has a backdoor key to your safe? If that’s the case, the safe is just a high school locker, with the principal holding the master code (or having the right to slice through your padlock). Moreover, the company website misleads consumers by implying that the only way to get into a safe is through mechanical means (i.e., a locksmith):

In effect, Liberty Safe has turned a search warrant into the type of general warrant that helped drive the American Revolution and that led to the Fourth Amendment. General warrants were issued to customs officials and allowed them to search a property anywhere, anytime, and in any way. That is why the Founders insisted that

The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized. (Emphasis added.)

Those paying attention were not pleased and have vowed that they will never buy a Liberty Safe product again, nor should anyone else:

The free market works quickly, though, and one company’s stupid policies are another company’s opportunity:

The last few years have provided a clarity long lacking in America. Between COVID, BLM and Antifa, and January 6, we are learning who in America believes in the Constitution and who does not, and who will comply with a government acting outside of the Constitution and who will not. I hate living in hard times, I really do, but it’s refreshing to be rid of those blinders that the mainstream media put on our faces in the 1950s, and that controlled much of our behavior and many of our beliefs ever since.

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