A Redditor Criticized ICE. Trump Is Trying to Unmask Them by Dragging the Company to a Secret Grand Jury.
4 months ago by HellsBelle to c/news
Social media giant Reddit has been ordered to appear before a grand jury in Washington, D.C., as part of a federal effort to unmask anonymous online critics of the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown.
According to a subpoena obtained by The Intercept, Reddit has until April 14 to provide a wide range of personal data on one of its users, whom U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents have been trying unsuccessfully to identify for more than a month.
Attorneys for the Reddit user say their client’s posts and their anonymity are squarely protected under the First Amendment and that ICE’s use of a grand jury marks a disturbing escalation for the agency after seeing its previous efforts to investigate political speech quashed in court. The subpoena was issued by federal prosecutors in the capital after ICE’s effort to identify the same user failed in a Northern California federal court. (The U.S. attorney’s office in Washington declined to comment on the case.)
Right? I figured they just gave them direct access before they asked.
If it ever got out that they did that, it would kill their user base, which is not in their shareholders' interest.
No, I don't think even that would cause the remaining folks to leave.
Yeah, I figured they'd toss him to the wolves without a second thought.
My question is how is this guy still on Reddit if his posts are bad enough for MAGA to go to war over it? They permaban people for sneezing, how did this guy get away with it for so long? I got permabanned for stating a fact.
They want to make an example I'm guessing
Reddit has to at least look like it's fighting this. It keeps other dissenters on the platform for future indictments.
conspiracy hat on
Or to make users comfortable using, organizing and sharing government-unfriendly stuff in Reddit.
Like how Apple goes to court 1 time to defend a case, but it gives data to feds in 100s of cases without resistance. And everyone thinks Apple is "privacy friendly".
It could be trying to manipulate public perception. They didn't build a global surveillance system for catching a few undesirables which tanks the platforms reputation forever.
They want to continue doing it while giving credence to platform independence.
Yeah it's so bad they have me hoping for a military coup, never in my life would i have ever dreamed of wanting a military coup but now after trump was elected i understand why they're necessary sometimes.
Bro the democratically elected president rapes children and starts wars for insider trading. Lile wtf are you talking about democracy??
"Firefighters usually dont install furniture" that's what you sound like
It’s state sponsored terrorism, period.
They are showing us what they can and will do if the rest of us don’t stop posting and get in line.
Wonder what was said…
Something accurate and damning
The least bit of accuracy would still be a bullseye with Thwump.
There was a thread from early January, after news outlets including The Intercept identified Jonathan Ross as the ICE officer who shot and killed 37-year-old Renee Good in Minneapolis. Commenting on a Minnesota Star Tribune article, another Reddit user posted that Ross might be welcomed as a hero in Florida or Texas. John Doe responded by sharing that Ross had lived in Chaska, Minnesota; grew up in Indiana; and served in the Indiana National Guard — biographical details that were circulating widely at the time. “Hopefully he moves up to Stillwater State Penitentiary,” they wrote.
In another post, a Reddit user asked what they should write on an anti-ICE protest sign. John Doe suggested the lyrics to a song: “Urine speaks louder than words.” In a third instance, Doe wrote, “TSA sucks and we all know it.” According to the Reddit user’s attorneys, these were the most aggressive posts they could find.
Pretty tame honestly.
Maybe they are just ‘testing the wire’ legally speaking. Ie just how solid are these laws? Re-approach, reframe. New case, try try again?
Part of a longer game, maybe?
IF they are even that organized
Gosh maybe ICE and the DOJ should read some executive orders, eh?
By the authority vested in me ... it is hereby ordered ... no Federal Government officer, employee, or agent engages in or facilitates any conduct that would unconstitutionally abridge the free speech of any American citizen...
The law doesn't matter anymore
Reddit, Meta, and Google voluntarily “complied with some of the requests” for identifying details of users critical of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) sent as part of a recent wave of administrative subpoenas the Department of Homeland Security has been distributing to Big Tech the past few months
DHS sent hundreds of subpoenas to Google, Meta, Reddit, and Discord demanding identities of anonymous accounts tracking ICE operations.
That implies posts that:
- Warn people of raids in real time
- Help people avoid ICE
- Coordinate responses to ICE presence
We should look for accounts that have a history like this:
- “ICE spotted at [location] right now”
- “Agents are at [apartment complex/business]”
- “Avoid [street/intersection]—ICE checkpoint”
Alternatively, it could also be something like this (though perhaps less likely):
- “Here’s how to avoid ICE checkpoints”
- “What to do if ICE shows up: …”
- “Don’t open the door unless…”
… or even aggregate statistics like this:
- “ICE has been operating in these neighborhoods this week”
- Maps or logs of sightings
…
I can’t imagine that they’re targeting this user for a reason too far off from why they targeted IceBlock, too.
Ideally, we can create a list of most probable users to have been targeted. Then we can warn them.
The Reddit user probably:
- Regularly posted ICE sightings or raid warnings
- Had a local or regional focus
- Was followed or relied on by others
That would corroborate with this passage:
ICE tried to identify the user for over a month and failed then escalated to a grand jury
That level of effort implies:
- The account was persistent
- The content was ongoing and impactful
- Likely high visibility or trusted by a community
Edit: found someone who shared the full article here: https://www.reddit.com/...
The story of how Reddit became ensnared in an ICE-related grand jury began early last month, when the company received a request to turn over the name, address, phone number, and other data associated with an account belonging to a user identified in court records as John Doe.
… In the John Doe case, Reddit received an initial request on March 4 from an ICE agent in Fairfax, Virginia.
… the social media company alerted John Doe of the federal request for information. Based in the Pacific Northwest, the Reddit user obtained representation from the Oregon-based Civil Liberties Defense Center
… There was a thread from early January, after news outlets including The Intercept identified Jonathan Ross as the ICE officer who shot and killed 37-year-old Renee Good in Minneapolis. Commenting on a Minnesota Star Tribune article, another Reddit user posted that Ross might be welcomed as a hero in Florida or Texas. John Doe responded by sharing that Ross had lived in Chaska, Minnesota; grew up in Indiana; and served in the Indiana National Guard — biographical details that were circulating widely at the time. “Hopefully he moves up to Stillwater State Penitentiary,” they wrote.
In another post, a Reddit user asked what they should write on an anti-ICE protest sign. John Doe suggested the lyrics to a song: “Urine speaks louder than words.” In a third instance, Doe wrote, “TSA sucks and we all know it.” According to the Reddit user’s attorneys, these were the most aggressive posts they could find.
This is exactly what Grand Juries are for and why the bar for indictment is so low.
It's a safeguard to prevent frivolous felony persecution by the State upon individuals.
It is to the Jurors to take one look at the evidence the prosecution presents and to say, nope, this is a BS case.
That's why it's so easy to get indictments. Generally, prosecutors only show up with actual evidence of potential wrong doing.
If they show up with nothing, in typical Trump legal team fashion, they will get no indictment.
They seem to think because THEY suck at law, everyone else does too. All competent lawyers left that administration. Believe it or not, plenty of lawyers actually have respect for the institutions they spent their lives training in and working in.
They don't have to win. They don't even have to follow through on their threat. They've already done what they meant to do and that's just to intimidate everyone else. There will be plenty of folks who see this and maybe speak out a little less or stop speaking out entirely. Do you think this case is going to get the same exposure after it's been dropped? They'll already be onto the next intimidation tactic.
What kind of reaction were you expecting to elicit with your comment?
My logic was, oh this guy is making excuses to not do anything because he's gone full nihilistic about the matter.
That would be me. Got booted from Reddit for encouraging someone, anybody really, to kill Netanyahu and Trump.
Of course I criticised their actions also.
I’d settle for five minutes alone with Trump.
at least you got banned for something decent.
I got banned for talking about how pedophiles should be put down... and got banned for... get this: threatening to murder reddit admins. way to admit what you reddit admins are. 🤣
There is a theory that Ghislaine Maxwell is/was a Reddit mod.
Me too. Shared my desire to wear a rapist's penis and testicles as a necklace.
Then the hammer dropped and I was out.
Their loss, our gain.
Thanks Chunk. :)
Now I gotta go watch the Goonies.
I thought they shadow banned everyone with opinions they don’t like. Happened to me after the Luigi situation
This happened on /r/behindthebastards! For anyone unaware, it's a fantastic podcast on Cool Zone Media that covers infamous evil people throughout history. Also check out the inverse, Cool People Who Did Cool Stuff, on the same podcast network. Also check out It Could Happen Here.
I knew it would be someone on there. One of the few subreddits I still lurk on.
How many of us wonder if we might be the user?
I was critical of ICE on Reddit more than once. Likely, hundreds of thousands have been. I wonder what this mystery user said to bring this sort of scrutiny. Probably something true.
Probably a Canadian, or Brit, lol.
Personally I dropped reddit when the api broke all apps except their own ad filled one. I do occasionally use it for niche stuff, but none of my browsers have my login tokens so it's always just not logged in access. I haven't made a single comment or upvote since I left, so all my critical comments would have been before his second term.
I have a hard time believing its just one even given how crappy reddit has become.
This is also the one they want to use to open the floodgates. If they are allowed even a toe step forward in this, it will be all out war on the first amendment.
What did this person say that pissed the ICEflakes off so, and why aren't we all saying it?
I made a number of comments regarding my sentiments towards the orange child rapist and felon on Reddit a year or so ago. All my accounts of many years roasted instantly.
The fact that these clowns take it to the courts instead of just sicking AI on the job of unmasking the user is really telling about thier intelligence.
Which AI? I asked Google AI about a webcomic, and it offered to find the artist for me. I said sure.
First it made something up completely out of thin air. Then it picked a random user who had commented on the comic. It had already identified the OC post of the comic, so all it had to do was check the username, and it couldn't even do that.
I would like to think the government has access to AI that has less guardrails and is tuned for this sort of thing by some intel organization. https://www.theverge.com/...
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