SUBSCRIBE TO OUR FREE NEWSLETTER
Daily news & progressive opinion—funded by the people, not the corporations—delivered straight to your inbox.
5
#000000
#FFFFFF
5
#000000
#FFFFFF
Federal investigators' use of Stingrays to hunt for an undocumented immigration marks "the latest sign of mission creep in domestic deployment of battlefield-strength surveillance technology," said EFF's Adam Schwartz. (Photo: Hakan Dahlstrom/flickr/cc)
Trump Admin. Now Deploying Controversial Surveillance Tool in Immigration Crackdown
Detroit News reports on "troubling" use of Stingrays in hunt for undocumented immigrant
May 20, 2017
As the Trump administration and Congressional Republicans continue to push for a harsher immigration crackdown, new reporting reveals that FBI and Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents employed a controversial surveillance technology known as Stingrays to hunt down undocumented immigrants.
According to Electronic Frontier Foundation's Adam Schwartz, the The Detroit News report, based on a federal search warrant affidavit, marks "the latest sign of mission creep in domestic deployment of battlefield-strength surveillance technology."
As the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) has explained, the devices, obtained by police to purportedly tackle terrorism,
typically mimic the cell phone towers that your phone connects to. They trick cell phones within their range into thinking they are a legitimate cell phone tower and force phones to connect by masquerading as the strongest nearby cell signal. This enables the user of the cell site simulator to identify phones in the area, the location of their possessors, and in some cases to intercept metadata and/or actual content of cell phone transmissions (including data, calls, or text messages). Even if law enforcement is targeting a particular phone or person, it will incidentally collect sensitive information from all other phones in the area that connect to it. In some cases, this may also prevent nearby bystanders from making calls. So, the use of this technology compromises the privacy and safety of large numbers of ordinary people.
In this case, The Detroit News reported, the
secret device [either a Stingray or an upgraded version of them known as Hailstorm] was used in March by a team of FBI and Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents in Metro Detroit to find Rudy Carcamo-Carranza, 23, a twice-deported restaurant worker from El Salvador whose only brushes with the law involve drunken driving allegations and a hit-and-run crash.
"Few law enforcement spying technologies are a greater threat to digital liberty: by their very nature, [cell site simulators or] CSSs seize information from all of the people who happen to be nearby. So government should be barred, for example, from using CSSs to hunt down traffic scofflaws, petty thieves, and undocumented immigrants," Schwartz wrote.
The ACLU expressed concern the surveillance tool was used in this way, and filed a Freedom of Information Act with ICE and U.S. Customs and Border Protection seeking information on how the Stingray devises are being used, with what frequency, and how bystanders' data is being protected.
"We're troubled to see evidence of ICE using invasive surveillance equipment for immigration enforcement purposes, especially given this administration's hyper-aggressive approach in this area," said ACLU attorney Nathan Freed Wessler. "It's crucial that the government release this information so the public can understand how immigration authorities are using Stingrays and what limits they're placing on this technology."
Why Your Ongoing Support Is Essential
Donald Trump’s attacks on democracy, justice, and a free press are escalating — putting everything we stand for at risk. We believe a better world is possible, but we can’t get there without your support. Common Dreams stands apart. We answer only to you — our readers, activists, and changemakers — not to billionaires or corporations. Our independence allows us to cover the vital stories that others won’t, spotlighting movements for peace, equality, and human rights. Right now, our work faces unprecedented challenges. Misinformation is spreading, journalists are under attack, and financial pressures are mounting. As a reader-supported, nonprofit newsroom, your support is crucial to keep this journalism alive. Whatever you can give — $10, $25, or $100 — helps us stay strong and responsive when the world needs us most. Together, we’ll continue to build the independent, courageous journalism our movement relies on. Thank you for being part of this community. |
Our work is licensed under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). Feel free to republish and share widely.
big brothercustoms and border protection (cbp)el salvadorimmigrationtechnologyus department of homeland security
As the Trump administration and Congressional Republicans continue to push for a harsher immigration crackdown, new reporting reveals that FBI and Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents employed a controversial surveillance technology known as Stingrays to hunt down undocumented immigrants.
According to Electronic Frontier Foundation's Adam Schwartz, the The Detroit News report, based on a federal search warrant affidavit, marks "the latest sign of mission creep in domestic deployment of battlefield-strength surveillance technology."
As the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) has explained, the devices, obtained by police to purportedly tackle terrorism,
typically mimic the cell phone towers that your phone connects to. They trick cell phones within their range into thinking they are a legitimate cell phone tower and force phones to connect by masquerading as the strongest nearby cell signal. This enables the user of the cell site simulator to identify phones in the area, the location of their possessors, and in some cases to intercept metadata and/or actual content of cell phone transmissions (including data, calls, or text messages). Even if law enforcement is targeting a particular phone or person, it will incidentally collect sensitive information from all other phones in the area that connect to it. In some cases, this may also prevent nearby bystanders from making calls. So, the use of this technology compromises the privacy and safety of large numbers of ordinary people.
In this case, The Detroit News reported, the
secret device [either a Stingray or an upgraded version of them known as Hailstorm] was used in March by a team of FBI and Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents in Metro Detroit to find Rudy Carcamo-Carranza, 23, a twice-deported restaurant worker from El Salvador whose only brushes with the law involve drunken driving allegations and a hit-and-run crash.
"Few law enforcement spying technologies are a greater threat to digital liberty: by their very nature, [cell site simulators or] CSSs seize information from all of the people who happen to be nearby. So government should be barred, for example, from using CSSs to hunt down traffic scofflaws, petty thieves, and undocumented immigrants," Schwartz wrote.
The ACLU expressed concern the surveillance tool was used in this way, and filed a Freedom of Information Act with ICE and U.S. Customs and Border Protection seeking information on how the Stingray devises are being used, with what frequency, and how bystanders' data is being protected.
"We're troubled to see evidence of ICE using invasive surveillance equipment for immigration enforcement purposes, especially given this administration's hyper-aggressive approach in this area," said ACLU attorney Nathan Freed Wessler. "It's crucial that the government release this information so the public can understand how immigration authorities are using Stingrays and what limits they're placing on this technology."
As the Trump administration and Congressional Republicans continue to push for a harsher immigration crackdown, new reporting reveals that FBI and Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents employed a controversial surveillance technology known as Stingrays to hunt down undocumented immigrants.
According to Electronic Frontier Foundation's Adam Schwartz, the The Detroit News report, based on a federal search warrant affidavit, marks "the latest sign of mission creep in domestic deployment of battlefield-strength surveillance technology."
As the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) has explained, the devices, obtained by police to purportedly tackle terrorism,
typically mimic the cell phone towers that your phone connects to. They trick cell phones within their range into thinking they are a legitimate cell phone tower and force phones to connect by masquerading as the strongest nearby cell signal. This enables the user of the cell site simulator to identify phones in the area, the location of their possessors, and in some cases to intercept metadata and/or actual content of cell phone transmissions (including data, calls, or text messages). Even if law enforcement is targeting a particular phone or person, it will incidentally collect sensitive information from all other phones in the area that connect to it. In some cases, this may also prevent nearby bystanders from making calls. So, the use of this technology compromises the privacy and safety of large numbers of ordinary people.
In this case, The Detroit News reported, the
secret device [either a Stingray or an upgraded version of them known as Hailstorm] was used in March by a team of FBI and Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents in Metro Detroit to find Rudy Carcamo-Carranza, 23, a twice-deported restaurant worker from El Salvador whose only brushes with the law involve drunken driving allegations and a hit-and-run crash.
"Few law enforcement spying technologies are a greater threat to digital liberty: by their very nature, [cell site simulators or] CSSs seize information from all of the people who happen to be nearby. So government should be barred, for example, from using CSSs to hunt down traffic scofflaws, petty thieves, and undocumented immigrants," Schwartz wrote.
The ACLU expressed concern the surveillance tool was used in this way, and filed a Freedom of Information Act with ICE and U.S. Customs and Border Protection seeking information on how the Stingray devises are being used, with what frequency, and how bystanders' data is being protected.
"We're troubled to see evidence of ICE using invasive surveillance equipment for immigration enforcement purposes, especially given this administration's hyper-aggressive approach in this area," said ACLU attorney Nathan Freed Wessler. "It's crucial that the government release this information so the public can understand how immigration authorities are using Stingrays and what limits they're placing on this technology."
We've had enough. The 1% own and operate the corporate media. They are doing everything they can to defend the status quo, squash dissent and protect the wealthy and the powerful. The Common Dreams media model is different. We cover the news that matters to the 99%. Our mission? To inform. To inspire. To ignite change for the common good. How? Nonprofit. Independent. Reader-supported. Free to read. Free to republish. Free to share. With no advertising. No paywalls. No selling of your data. Thousands of small donations fund our newsroom and allow us to continue publishing. Can you chip in? We can't do it without you. Thank you.
LATEST NEWS
'Corporate Crime Pays' Under Trump as His Agencies Drop Enforcement Against 165 Companies
"The Trump administration is protecting lawbreaking corporate insiders from accountability instead of protecting Americans from corporate lawbreaking," said the author of a new Public Citizen report.
Aug 14, 2025
During the first six months of his second term, President Donald Trump's administration has withdrawn or suspended enforcement actions against 165 companies in sectors across the U.S. economy, with Big Tech benefiting most from federal agencies' lax approach to corporate crime.
A report released Wednesday by the consumer advocacy group Public Citizen found that the Trump administration has halted or ended a third of misconduct investigations and enforcement actions targeting technology firms—including behemoths such as Meta, Tesla, and Google.
Both Meta and Google donated to Trump's inaugural fund, and Tesla CEO Elon Musk spent big in support of the president's 2024 White House bid. Public Citizen found that the tech corporations that have benefited from Trump administration decisions to drop enforcement efforts have spent a combined $1.2 billion trying to influence the president.
"The Trump administration is protecting lawbreaking corporate insiders from accountability instead of protecting Americans from corporate lawbreaking," said Rick Claypool, a research director for Public Citizen and author of the new report. "To Big Tech corporations, this sends the message there is little risk in breaking the law in pursuit of profit—especially if you are an ally of the administration."
"For insiders," Claypool added, "corporate crime pays."
"Although he pretends to be tough on Big Tech, Donald Trump is a willing enabler of Big Tech's wrongdoing."
Public Citizen's report comes amid growing scrutiny of what one critic recently described as "the incredible shrinking Trump antitrust enforcers."
Despite claims of a "surging MAGA antitrust movement," Trump's Justice Department and Federal Trade Commission have repeatedly shown a willingness to bow to White House-connected lobbyists and allow corporate consolidation to proceed unabated. Last week, as Common Dreams reported, the Trump DOJ settled a Biden-era legal challenge against UnitedHealth Group, allowing the monopolist to swallow yet another competitor.
"The second Trump administration has now become a pay-to-play operation where influential MAGA lobbyists paid millions by large corporations use their clout with the president and Attorney General Pam Bondi to overrule the enforcers and push through mergers," The American Prospect's David Dayen wrote following news of the UnitedHealth settlement.
"It seems that if you're a company and can pony up the money," Dayen added, "you can get whatever regulatory treatment you wish. Bribery has gone in a few short months from a prohibited activity to the coin of the realm in Trump's America."
As Public Citizen's report showed, tech giants have been the chief beneficiaries of what the group characterized as the Trump administration's corrupt approach to corporate crime enforcement.
At the start of Trump's second term, at least 104 tech corporations faced more than 140 federal investigations and enforcement actions. The Trump administration has withdrawn or halted nearly 50 of those enforcement actions, Public Citizen found.
"Although he pretends to be tough on Big Tech, Donald Trump is a willing enabler of Big Tech's wrongdoing," Robert Weissman, co-president of Public Citizen, said in a statement. "For Big Tech, a relative pittance in political spending has generated gigantic returns in dropped prosecutions, policy U-turns, and aggressive administration support for Big Tech's global agenda."
'Go Home Fascists': Protesters Jeer Federal Agents in Streets of DC
Demonstrators yelled at federal agents to "get off our streets" as they set up a police checkpoint on a popular street in the nation's capital.
Aug 14, 2025
More than 100 protesters gathered late Wednesday at a checkpoint set up by a combination of local and federal officers on a popular street in Washington, D.C., where U.S. President Donald Trump has taken over the police force and deployed around 800 National Guard members as part of what he hopes will be a long-term occupation of the country's capital—and potentially other major cities.
The officers at the Wednesday night checkpoint reportedly included agents from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, which is also taking part in immigration raids in the city. Some agents were wearing face coverings to conceal their identities.
After law enforcement agents established the checkpoint on 14th Street, protesters gathered and jeered the officers, chanting "get off our streets" and "go home fascists." Some demonstrators yelled at the agents standing at the checkpoint, while others warned oncoming drivers to turn to avoid the police installation.
There was no officially stated purpose for the checkpoint, but it came amid the Trump administration's lawless mass deportation campaign and its broader threats to deploy U.S. troops on the streets of American cities to crush dissent.
At least one person, a Black woman, was arrested at Wednesday's checkpoint. One D.C. resident posted to Reddit that agents were "pulling people out of cars who are 'suspicious' or if they don't like the answers to their questions." The Washington Post reported that a "mix of local and federal authorities pulled over drivers for seat belt violations or broken taillights."
The National Guard troops activated by Trump this week were not seen at the checkpoint, which shut down before midnight.
Wednesday night's protests are expected to be just the start as public anger mounts over Trump's authoritarian actions in the nation's capital—where violent crime fell to a 30-year low last year—and across the country.
Radley Balko, a journalist who has documented the growing militarization of U.S. police, wrote earlier this week that "the motivation for Donald Trump's plan to 'federalize' Washington, D.C., is same as his motivation for sending active-duty troops into Los Angeles, deporting people to the CECOT torture prison in El Salvador, his politicization of the Department of Justice, and nearly every other authoritarian overreach of the last six months: He is testing the limits of his power—and, by extension, of our democracy."
"He's feeling out what the Supreme Court, Congress, and the public will let him get away with. And so far, he's been able to do what he pleases," Balko wrote. "We are now past the point of crisis. Trump has long dreamed of presiding over a police state. He has openly admired and been reluctant to criticize foreign leaders who helm one. He has now appointed people who have expressed their willingness to help him achieve one to the very positions with the power to make one happen. And both he and his highest-ranking advisers have both openly spoken about and written out their plans to implement one."
"It's time to believe them," Balko added.
Trump White House Says Military Occupation of Nation's Capital Set to Expand
One critic accused the president of "testing the limits of his power, hoping to intimidate other cities into submission to his every vengeful whim."
Aug 13, 2025
The Trump administration's military occupation of Washington, D.C. is expected to expand, a White House official said Wednesday, with President Donald Trump also saying he will ask Congress to approve a "long-term" extension of federal control over local police in the nation's capital.
The unnamed Trump official told CNN that a "significantly higher" number of National Guard troops are expected on the ground in Washington later Wednesday to support law enforcement patrols in the city.
"The National Guard is not arresting people," the official said, adding that troops are tasked with creating "a safe environment" for the hundreds of federal officers and agents from over a dozen agencies who are fanning out across the city over the strong objection of local officials.
Trump dubiously declared a public safety emergency Monday in order to take control of Washington police under Section 740 of the District of Columbia Self-Government and Governmental Reorganization Act. The president said Wednesday that he would ask the Republican-controlled Congress to authorize an extension of his federal takeover of local police beyond the 30 days allowed under Section 740.
"Already they're saying, 'He's a dictator,'" Trump said of his critics during remarks at the Kennedy Center in Washington. "The place is going to hell. We've got to stop it. So instead of saying, 'He's a dictator,' they should say, 'We're going to join him and make Washington safe.'"
According to official statistics, violent crime in Washington is down 26% from a year ago, when it was at its second-lowest level since 1966,
House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) and Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) have both expressed support for Trump's actions. However, any legislation authorizing an extension of federal control over local police would face an uphill battle in the Senate, where Democratic lawmakers can employ procedural rules to block the majority's effort.
Trump also said any congressional authorization could open the door to targeting other cities in his crosshairs, including Baltimore, Chicago, Los Angeles, New York, and Oakland. Official statistics show violent crime trending downward in all of those cities—with some registering historically low levels.
While some critics have called Trump's actions in Washington a distraction from his administration's mishandling of the Jeffrey Epstein scandal, others say his occupation of the nation's capital is a test case to see what he can get away with in other cities.
Kat Abughazaleh, a Democratic candidate for Congress in Illinois, said Monday that the president's D.C. takeover "is another telltale sign of his authoritarian ambitions."
Some opponents also said Trump's actions are intended to intimidate Democrat-controlled cities, pointing to his June order to deploy thousands of National Guard troops to Los Angeles in response to protests against his administration's mass deportation campaign.
Testifying Wednesday at a San Francisco trial to determine whether Trump violated the Posse Comitatus Act of 1878—which generally prohibits use of the military for domestic law enforcement—by sending troops to Los Angeles, California Deputy Attorney General Meghan Strong argued that the president wanted to "strike fear into the hearts of Californians."
Roosevelt University political science professor and Newsweek contributor David Faris wrote Wednesday that "deploying the National Guard to Washington, D.C. is an unconscionable abuse of federal power and another worrisome signpost on our road to autocracy."
"Using the military to bring big, blue cities to heel, exactly as 'alarmists' predicted during the 2024 campaign, isn't about a crisis in D.C.—violent crime is actually at a 30-year low," he added. "President Trump is, once again, testing the limits of his power, hoping to intimidate other cities into submission to his every vengeful whim by making the once unimaginable—an American tyrant ordering a military occupation of our own capital—a terrifying reality."
Most Popular
We cover the issues the corporate media never will.
Please support our journalism.