Court records detail Clearview AI’s role in ICE protest surveillance

Newly disclosed court records show Homeland Security Investigations used Clearview AI facial recognition as one element of a broader undercover operation that infiltrated activist groups, monitored encrypted communications and built intelligence files on people protesting immigration enforcement in Minnesota.

Homeland Security Investigations (HSI), the investigative arm of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), sent undercover agents into community meetings and activist groups during Operation Metro Surge. The agents secretly recorded conversations, entered private Signal discussions, collected vehicle information and investigated financial relationships involving labor unions and progressive organizations.

The records indicate Clearview AI searches formed one component of larger intelligence files that combined facial recognition results with vehicle records, social media and other investigative data.

The documents became public as exhibits to a discovery motion filed on behalf of Isaac Sant, one of 15 defendants who were accused of conspiring to impede federal immigration officers during the operation.

According to Sant’s attorneys, the government produced at least two Clearview AI search reports in the case. One returned photographs of another man as possible matches and included Facebook images of the man’s wife and child.

Sant’s lawyers are seeking additional government records they say are necessary to determine how far the surveillance extended and whether people engaging in protected First Amendment activity were swept into federal investigations without an adequate criminal predicate.

The government’s investigative records establish that there was an undercover operation considerably broader than the visible confrontations between immigration agents and observers that drew national attention earlier this year.

According to the records, HSI opened Operation Puppet Master on January 28, authorizing undercover personnel to penetrate groups and gatherings the agency believed might pose a threat to federal officers.

A second investigation, Project Whipple Shield, followed in February and sought to identify organizational structures and sources of financial support behind activity the government associated with violence, property destruction, intimidation or interference with federal operations.

Undercover agents attended gatherings at churches, libraries, schools, parks, restaurants and union facilities, and secretly recorded participants and entered encrypted communications used by activists.

One agent used the name “peanutbutterjelly” in Signal conversations with organizers. At a meeting of the group Sunrise Movement, a progressive 501(c)(4) that advocates political action on climate change, the agent reported that participants described their planned demonstrations as peaceful.

According to the defense filing, the agent nevertheless told one participant that he had construction skills and could build things useful for more aggressive direct action and indicated that he was willing to risk arrest. The agent was never taken up on his offer.

The exchange is among the reasons Sant’s attorneys contend federal agents did more than merely observe existing conduct.

At a meeting at Prince of Peace Lutheran Church, agents recorded license plates from vehicles belonging to attendees which HSI agents used to identify information connected to the vehicles, social media and other sources to create what HSI described as intelligence workups containing photographs and biographical information.

A separate lawsuit filed in July alleged that federal immigration agents routinely photographed and filmed the faces, vehicles and license plates of people observing immigration operations. Some Minnesota observers reported that agents addressed them by name even though they had never identified themselves. Others said federal vehicles led them back to their own homes.

Nicole Cleland, a trained legal observer, said she was following federal immigration vehicles at a safe distance when a Border Patrol agent approached her car, called her by name and told her he had facial recognition and a body camera.

Three days later, Cleland’s Global Entry and TSA PreCheck privileges were revoked. Her lawsuit alleges that the action was retaliation for constitutionally protected activities.

DHS disputes the broader allegation that it maintains a policy of tracking and retaliating against lawful observers of ICE operations, and the public record has not established what system, if any, connected Cleland’s encounter with the later trusted traveler decision.

The newly released HSI records do demonstrate that investigators were using facial recognition and building intelligence profiles on protesters during the same Minnesota operation.

Sant’s lawyers are asking for every Clearview AI report generated on protesters and activists during Metro Surge, along with additional undercover reports and communications.

The records further expose an important gap in ICE’s published privacy framework. A November 2024 ICE privacy assessment covering HSI’s operational use of publicly available and social media information says searches ordinarily should have a nexus to authorized law enforcement activity.

Protected speech outside that activity is not supposed to be retained, and online information is supposed to be corroborated through conventional investigative methods. But that assessment expressly excludes undercover operations.

The investigation also moved beyond identification. HSI examined financial relationships involving organizations including the Service Employees International Union and Communications Workers of America, as well as nonprofit and activist groups.

The records describe investigators seeking information concerning wire transfers, political action committee spending and transactions through payment services.

Government investigators also monitored Whipple Watch, a group whose members observed vehicles entering and leaving the Bishop Henry Whipple Federal Building where ICE officers were detaining people.

Sant’s lawyers argue that the combined operation amounted to political surveillance of people who were frequently engaged in lawful protest, association and observation.

Federal officials have maintained that investigators were responding to threats and interference directed at immigration officers.

Federal law permits undercover investigations and intelligence collection when connected to legitimate law enforcement purposes, but the Privacy Act imposes restrictions on government maintenance of records describing how people exercise First Amendment rights unless the information is pertinent to an authorized law enforcement activity. Whether Operation Metro Surge remained within those legal limits is likely to become one of the central questions as Sant’s case proceeds.

Article Topics

biometric matching  |  biometrics  |  Clearview AI  |  facial recognition  |  ICE - U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement  |  identity intelligence  |  U.S. Government  |  video surveillance