Given the unprecedented millions of Biden illegal aliens who are invading our country, it is only common sense that when I'm re-elected, we will begin, and we have no choice, the largest deportation operation in American history.
ICE Today
ICE Today
You're Considered a Domestic Terrorist
An investigation into ICE surveillance gone awry
Defendants Are Gathering Information About Individuals Engaged in Protected Activity, Often Harnessing New Surveillance Tools and Technologies.
- Consistent with Plaintiffs’ experiences, it has been widely reported that DHS agents are routinely photographing, filming, recording, or otherwise capturing information about observers at immigration enforcement operations. These encounters have been reported not just in Maine, but also in other cities, such as Minneapolis and Chicago.
- Agents have used both smartphones and professional-grade photo equipment to capture photographs of observers. On January 24, 2026, it was reported that ICE agents were using sophisticated equipment to scan the faces of the crowd that gathered in Minneapolis in response to Alex Pretti’s shooting.
- According to a February 10, 2026 report in Reuters, two ICE officials confirmed that “ICE has been tracking the names of protesters in an internal database for several months.” The government database reportedly “contains names, photos, actions that provoked suspicion, locations and license plates.”
- Other government officials have confirmed that Defendants are systematically collecting and maintaining information about observers.
- According to recent reporting by freelance journalist Ken Klippenstein, DHS has ordered agents to gather identifying information about any person filming them and to “send that information to Intel who will do a ‘work-up’ on them.” The “work-up” would include “trying to identify them via social media, running their license plates if available, and running a criminal history check.”
- In January 2026, a DHS official sent a memorandum to HSI agents assigned to Minnesota asking them to “capture all images, license plates, identifications, and general information on hotels [sic], agitators, protestors, etc., so we can capture it all in one consolidated form.” The form is titled “intel collection non-arrests,” indicating that it is used to record information about individuals who are not arrested for criminal activity.
Defendants Have Logged the First Amendment Activities of Observers into Databases and Watchlists that They Maintain or Access.
- Also pursuant to the challenged policy and practice, Defendants have maintained the personal identifying information they collect in official government databases or watchlists, in response to observers exercising their protected First Amendment rights.
- As noted, two ICE officials have confirmed to Reuters that ICE has an “internal database” tracking the names of protestors, along with “photos, actions that provoked suspicion, locations and license plates.”
- On January 28, 2026, Ken Klippenstein reported that two senior national security officials confirmed the existence of more than a dozen “watchlists” that Defendant DHS is using to track protestors and/or so-called “domestic terrorists” (the same label affixed to Plaintiffs by Defendants). According to the report, the lists and applications are “new domestic-related watchlists—a set of databases and applications—[that] exist inside and outside the FBI and are used by agencies like ICE and the Border Patrol,” and are referred to by code names like “Bluekey, Grapevine, Hummingbird, Reaper, Sandcastle, Sienna, Slipstream, and Sparta.” These lists and applications are “interlocking,” and some are reportedly “used to link people on the streets together, including collecting on friends and families who have nothing to do with any purported lawbreaking.”
- According to the same report, a DHS lawyer said about the collection and maintenance practice, “We over collect and everyone agrees we should create this or that list or application to wrestle the information to submission lest we miss something important.... So the data people do their thing and pretty soon you actually have Big Brother.”
Section 2: How We Got Here
In reorganizing the federal government, the Congress has a responsibility to guard against attempts to also reorganize the checks and balances of the constitutional system. The greatest risk in moving too quickly is that we will grant unprecedented powers to this administration that would weaken our constitutional system of government. Pay attention. The Congress should be seriously concerned about the transfer authority that is being sought by this administration.
Source
American DragnetSection 3: Trump's Second Term
Mission: Protect America through criminal investigations and enforcing immigration laws to preserve national security and public safety.
Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) is the principal investigative component of DHS and is responsible for investigating, disrupting, and dismantling transnational criminal organizations (TCOs) and terrorist networks that threaten or seek to exploit the customs and immigration laws of the United States.
Shortly after Trump’s executive order, ICE’s acting director, Todd M. Lyons, told Glenn Beck in an interview that the agency will deploy some of its elite investigative officers to probe anti-ICE protester networks. “We have some of the best special agents, criminal investigators,” Lyons said on Beck’s podcast. “We are going to track the money. We are going to track these ringleaders.”
Attribution: Washington Post (October 17, 2025).
The artificial intelligence (AI) tools built to guard America’s borders are now extending their policing powers into America’s neighborhoods. What began as AI-powered immigration enforcement confined primarily to our southern border is rapidly becoming something else: a quiet expansion of government surveillance into everyday life.
Facial recognition, biometric scanning, and social-media monitoring — once justified for tracking noncitizens — are now being used to identify and investigate U.S. citizens. This is mission creep, a military term for a shift in objectives that gradually turns a limited mission into something far larger. And it’s happening right now.
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is accelerating its investment in artificial intelligence for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) with little public scrutiny. Procurement records reveal a sweeping expansion of surveillance technology, including:
- $30 million for Palantir’s ImmigrationOS, which promises “granular tracking” of immigrants, including real-time monitoring of self-deportations.
- $4.6 million for iris-scanning smartphones from BI2 Technologies.
- $3.75 million for a Clearview AI facial-recognition contract — ICE’s largest purchase of the technology to date.
This is not just abstract policy. These surveillance technologies are already being used on the streets. Internal footage obtained by Media 404 shows ICE officers using facial recognition apps to determine the citizenship status of teenagers who were not carrying IDs. One app, Mobile Fortify, draws from over 200 million images stored in the databases of DHS, the FBI, and the State Department. It also appears to tap into super query tools, systems that aggregate data across multiple government databases for deeper access into personal networks.
Since Media 404’s initial reporting, additional investigations have made clear that these were not isolated uses. Reporting by Minnesota Public Radio and the Guardian shows ICE acquiring and operating AI-enabled surveillance tools that surveil U.S. citizens and expand beyond the reach of immigration enforcement. In Minnesota, ICE has purchased and deployed social media monitoring and location-tracking systems that allow agents to analyze the movements of large groups of people in specific locations — capabilities that, according to company materials and reporting, are explicitly marketed for use at protests and other gatherings protected under the First Amendment. ICE and other agencies haven’t specifically said who they are targeting, but these tools let them monitor where people have been and map their connections — without a warrant or specific suspicion. Increased AI surveillance comes at a time when ICE agents have already been instructed to collect the personal information of protestors, as they did with Alex Pretti days before
Section 4: Solutions
Rep. Zoe Lofgren (D-CA), Rep. Warren Davidson (R-OH), Sen. Ron Wyden (D-OR), and Mike Lee (R-UT), yesterday introduced an updated version of the Government Surveillance Reform Act to enact new protections for Americans’ rights, including stopping the federal government from buying data on Americans from shady data brokers, while reauthorizing and reforming Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA).
The Government Surveillance Reform Act is the only bipartisan, bicameral bill on offer to reform FISA 702 and other government surveillance programs. It is cosponsored by Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA), Sen. Cynthia Lummis (R-WY), Rep. Sara Jacobs (D-CA), and Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-WA).
The Government Surveillance Reform Act would represent the most comprehensive reform of surveillance laws in nearly half a century. The bill reauthorizes Section 702 for four years with necessary privacy reforms and constitutional safeguards, including:
- Closing the backdoor search loophole: The bill requires the federal government to get a warrant to access Americans’ private communications gathered under Section 702, with important exceptions for emergency situations.
- Closing the data broker loophole: The bill bans the federal government from buying Americans’ data from data brokers without a warrant.
- Prohibiting reverse targeting: The bill prohibits using surveillance on foreigners overseas through Section 702 as a pretext for gathering data on Americans.
- Repealing the “make everyone a spy” provision: This bill repeals a controversial 2024 expansion that allows the government to force millions of Americans and companies to secretly spy on its behalf.
- Reforming intelligence collection outside FISA: This bill protects Americans from intelligence agencies using non-statutory authorities, including by prohibiting backdoor searches and reverse targeting outside of FISA.
- Updating privacy protections for AI and other modern technologies: This bill requires federal law enforcement to get a warrant to surveil Americans’ location information, web browsing data, search and chatbot records, and car onboard and telematics data.
- Halting warrantless collection of business records: This bill protects Americans’ data from warrantless collection under an authority that expired over five years ago.
- Enhancing oversight and accountability: The bill strengthens judicial oversight, public reporting, and accountability requirements under FISA.
This Bill Has Received Support From Major Advocacy Groups
For years, the U.S. intelligence community has repeatedly misused its authorities under FISA, including Section 702, as well as other surveillance powers, undermining public trust and raising concerns across the political spectrum. Protecting constitutional rights and protecting national security are not opposing goals. We applaud the reintroduction of the Government Surveillance Reform Act, a bipartisan path forward that brings back a comprehensive package of reforms. This package responsibly reins in warrantless surveillance while preserving the tools needed to keep Americans safe. We commend Senators Wyden and Lee, along with Representatives Davidson and Lofgren, for once again leading this cross‑party effort to advance essential, rights‑protecting reforms.
The Government Surveillance Reform Act contains critical reforms to protect U. S. persons from unreasonable and warrantless government surveillance. It would rein in AI-driven misuse of NSA classified databases to spy on U. S. persons without probable cause or a warrant; it would make much less likely that Americans would be harassed or prosecuted on the basis of poor-quality data held on them by data brokers; and it would make it easier for people unfairly surveilled to get redress from the courts. We warmly encourage the Judiciary Committees in the House and the Senate to mark up a bill that takes the best parts of this bill, Senator Lee's and Senator Durbin's SAFE Act and Rep. Biggs' Protect Liberty Act, before the sunset of these authorities in April.
Airlines Reporting Corporation (ARC), a data broker owned by the U.S.’s major airlines, will shut down a program in which it sold access to hundreds of millions of flight records to the government and let agencies track peoples’ movements without a warrant, according to a letter from ARC shared with 404 Media.
ARC says it informed lawmakers and customers about the decision earlier this month. The move comes after intense pressure from lawmakers and 404 Media’s months-long reporting about ARC’s data selling practices. The news also comes after 404 Media reported on Tuesday that the IRS had searched the massive database of Americans flight data without a warrant.
“As part of ARC’s programmatic review of its commercial portfolio, we have previously determined that TIP is no longer aligned with ARC’s core goals of serving the travel industry,” the letter, written by ARC President and CEO Lauri Reishus, reads. TIP is the Travel Intelligence Program. As part of that, ARC sold access to a massive database of peoples’ flights, showing who travelled where, and when, and what credit card they used.
“All TIP customers, including the government agencies referenced in your letter, were notified on November 12, 2025, that TIP is sunsetting this year,” Reishus continued. Reishus was responding to a letter sent to airline executives earlier on Tuesday by Senator Ron Wyden, Congressman Andy Biggs, Chair of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus Adriano Espaillat, and Senator Cynthia Lummis. That letter revealed the IRS’s warrantless use of ARC’s data and urged the airlines to stop the ARC program. ARC says it notified Espaillat's office on November 14.
ARC is co-owned by United, American, Delta, Southwest, JetBlue, Alaska, Lufthansa, Air France, and Air Canada. The data broker acts as a bridge between airlines and travel agencies. Whenever someone books a flight through one of more than 12,800 travel agencies, such as Expedia, Kayak, or Priceline, ARC receives information about that booking. It then packages much of that data and sells it to the government, which can search it by name, credit card, and more. 404 Media has reported that ARC’s customers include the FBI, multiple components of the Department of Homeland Security, ATF, the SEC, TSA, and the State Department.
Espaillat told 404 Media in a statement “this is what we do. This is how we’re fighting back. Other industry groups in the private sector should follow suit. They should not be in cahoots with ICE, especially in ways may be illegal.”
Wyden said in a statement “it shouldn't have taken pressure from Congress for the airlines to finally shut down the sale of their customers’ travel data to government agencies by ARC, but better late than never. I hope other industries will see that selling off their customers' data to the government and anyone with a checkbook is bad for business and follow suit.”
There is no shortage of bad ideas in Congress, and too many have a chance to become law these days. An example is the Fourth Amendment Is Not For Sale Act, which would prohibit the U.S. government from buying digital information that would remain available to the likes of China and Russia.
The bill, scheduled for a House vote on Wednesday, would ban the government from buying information on Americans from data brokers. This would include many things in the cloud of digital exhaust most Americans leave behind online, from information on the websites they visit to credit-card information, health information and political opinions.
Our libertarian friends fret that letting the government buy data infringes on the Fourth Amendment’s guarantee against unreasonable searches. But the Supreme Court held in U.S. v Miller (1976) that “a person has no legitimate expectation of privacy in information he voluntarily turns over to third parties.” The Court updated Fourth Amendment law on tracking cellphone location data in Carpenter v. U.S. (2018), but the Not For Sale Act goes much further.
The Justice Department says the bill, sponsored by Rep. Warren Davidson (R., Ohio), would limit the ability of U.S. law enforcement to seek information online that often helps solve federal crimes, including hacks and other malicious digital acts. The bill also bans the purchase of records on Americans’ location information, a change that Justice says would hinder the ability to track missing children, hunt fugitives and investigate criminal networks.
The bill would force U.S. intelligence officials to avoid data that could include information on an American. That’s a burden on tools the Defense Department uses to protect foreign military bases and troops abroad.
In a letter to Judiciary Chairman Jim Jordan and ranking Democrat Jerrold Nadler in December 2023, the Fraternal Order of Police wrote that banning the use of digital information would end law enforcement’s access to “tools that generate leads into crucial and often complex cases.” The National Sheriffs Association says the proposal “empowers the cartels.”
The bill’s co-sponsors include voices on the extremes of both parties, including Rep. Andy Biggs (R., Ariz.) and Democrats Pramila Jayapal (D., Wash.) and Mr. Nadler. Let’s hope the sensible center prevails on this one.
Section 5: Additional Information
Additional details on AI usage and sources can be found below.