Published Jul 13, 2026, 5:01 AM EDT
The lawsuit on First Amendment grounds challenges the Trump administration's "chilled speech" over ICE-related criticisms, including online.
A New York man named David Streever sent a critical email to the then-head of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), leading to purported intimidation tactics that have now resulted in a new federal lawsuit. Roughly five months later and after returning from an overseas vacation with his 5-year-old daughter, the Rochester man found out that ICE agents were staking out his New York City hotel. It prompted a federal lawsuit filed July 6 by the nonprofit free speech organization Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE) in the District of Columbia on First Amendment grounds, claiming that ICE and the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) that oversees the agency are engaging in unconstitutional actions. DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin is a defendant in the suit. The lawsuit asks the court to order DHS and ICE officials to stop its speech-chilling coercion and retaliation against Streever for his protected speech. "I think that everyone agrees that if law enforcement came to David's home and arrested him for this email—everyone would look at that and say that's a violation of the First Amendment," Adam Steinbaugh, senior attorney at FIRE and lead counsel on the case, told Military.com. "You can't arrest people for their free speech. "Here, you have federal agents coming to someone's home and handing their wife a notice, essentially alleging that they're committing a crime because of their speech and telling them to knock it off. That's still a violation of the First Amendment."
