Protesters march through downtown Chicago demonstrating against ICE, June 10, 2025.
PHILADELPHIA – The American Civil Liberties Union is suing the federal government, seeking to discover how immigration agents are gathering information on online critics.
The ACLU of Pennsylvania filed suit last week in Philadelphia federal court against Immigration and Customs Enforcement after ICE failed to fulfill a Freedom of Information Act request. At issue are “unmasking subpoenas” used by the Trump administration to identify dissidents.
In one example, Reddit was ordered to a secret grand jury to unveil the identity of one of its posters. ACLU-PA submitted a FOIA request on Feb. 8 that sought each unmasking subpoena, plus other documents related to them.
“The ACLU-PA seeks these records as part of an investigation into expanding efforts by DHS, through ICE, to identify people expressing anonymous opinions on social media critical of DHS’s immigration enforcement activities,” the suit says.
“DHS’s efforts to unmask anonymous social media users because of the content of their speech raise First Amendment concerns.”
Handling the case will be U.S. magistrate judge Caroline Goldner Cinquanto, who took that post last year. She will need to decide whether ICE has violated the Freedom of Information Act by not timely responding to the ACLU’s request.
Online records show the FOIA request’s status as “Initial Determination,” but ICE “has not otherwise acknowledged receipt of the request,” the ACLU wrote. The suit charges ICE with failure to timely respond, failure to conduct adequate searches and improper withholding of agency records.
