Court Filing Alleges ICE Used Palantir Database to Build Dossiers on Protesters
Unsealed court documents say Homeland Security agents compiled files with photos and license plates on people who observed or protested ICE operations in Maine, stored in a Palantir-built database. DHS calls the case meritless and denies such a database exists.
The records come from a partially unsealed filing concerning a January ICE operation in Maine, Wired reported. The document is part of a class action lawsuit, and a redacted version became publicly available on Friday.
According to the lawsuit, DHS agents tracked and intimidated observers and protesters, in some cases driving past their homes or labeling them "Threat to Law Enforcement, Professional Protestor." In one instance described in the filing, an agent called a plaintiff's cellphone and suggested she tell her spouse "not to do anything like that in the future because people who are doing things like that might get added to a domestic terrorism watchlist."
The database is identified in the filing as Investigative Case Management, a Palantir product. Neither Palantir nor ICE is quoted in the Wired account commenting on the specific allegations about the system's use.
Lawyers representing the plaintiffs argued that compiling such files chills the First Amendment rights of people who observe or demonstrate against immigration enforcement. A DHS spokesperson told Wired the case was "meritless" and denied the existence of a database that labels and tracks "domestic terrorists."
The two accounts diverge on the core factual question: the filing describes a system used to record and flag protesters, while the department denies maintaining any such database. The litigation in which the filing was made remains pending, and the publicly available version is redacted.
Editor's Summary
A partially unsealed class action filing alleges that DHS agents used a Palantir-built database called Investigative Case Management to compile dossiers, including photos and license plate numbers, on people who observed or protested ICE activity in Maine, with one plaintiff reportedly warned about a domestic terrorism watchlist. Plaintiffs' lawyers say the practice chills First Amendment rights, while a DHS spokesperson called the case meritless and denied that such a database exists. The records became public only in redacted form, and the case continues.