The FBI spied on a private Signal group chat among immigration activists, according to a report from The Guardian. The activists were organizing “courtwatch” efforts in New York City this spring.
The Guardian obtained law enforcement documents showing that agents gained access to private conversations in a chat used to coordinate volunteer activists. Those activists monitor proceedings at three New York federal immigration courts.
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A “joint situational information report” from the FBI and the New York Police Department reportedly quoted messages from the chat and characterized the volunteers as “anarchist violent extremist actors.”
Watching proceedings
According to The Guardian, activists have been expanding efforts to monitor proceedings because Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers have increasingly detained immigrants who show up for routine hearings.
The detentions come after President Donald Trump issued a directive authorizing agents to arrest immigrants in court. That authority was previously restricted under the Biden administration over concerns that arrests would affect the “fair administration of justice.”
One incident sparked national backlash when an officer forced a woman against a wall and knocked her to the floor inside New York City’s immigration courthouse.
The report
The FBI said the information gathered for the report came from “a sensitive source with excellent access.” It introduced the findings as a warning about “extremist actors targeting law enforcement officers and federal facilities.”
FBI agents managed to gather information from a May “debrief session held via Signal call” with the volunteer courtwatchers, according to The Guardian. During the meeting, participants discussed where to go and how to gain access to federal courtrooms, which are open to the public.
“In private encrypted online chats, the identified [individual] is known to instruct protest participants to use violence against [law enforcement],” the FBI wrote in its report.
Response to surveillance
New York City comptroller Brad Lander, who was arrested in September inside an immigration courthouse while accompanying an immigrant New Yorker, condemned the FBI’s surveillance in a statement to The Guardian.
“Observing immigration court hearings is a legal and non-violent act, unlike the ICE abductions we have witnessed regularly for months outside of the courtrooms,” Lander said. “The mission of courtwatch is to provide transparency and ensure people are not disappeared without due process — surveillance and intimidation by Trump’s corrupted Justice Department won’t stop us from showing up to protect our neighbors and the rule of law.”
The Guardian said the FBI and the Department of Homeland Security declined to comment on the report or the surveillance.
However, a Department of Justice spokesperson shared a statement. It said, “After four years of the Biden administration forcing immigration courts to implement a de facto amnesty for hundreds of thousands of aliens, this Department of Justice is restoring integrity to our courts and will continue to enforce federal immigration law to protect national security and public safety.”
