It's not, it's just audited. If you go to the bank and give them 10,000 dollars they don't lock you up. They just have one of their people do some research and ask you for some paperwork.

Now, the police seizing money is different, but the police are the police. They can do almost anything they want, and you have next to zero recourse. Of course, they're going to abuse this and steal your money.

Civil forfeiture is even worse, indeed. Legalized highway robbery.

You should also be able to go into a bank and deposit $10k in cash without an anal exam or mandatory reporting to the federal government.

At minimum all of these rules should be inflation-adjusted.