DHS can't create vast DNA database to track ICE critics, lawsuit says [View all]

Four protesters are suing to stop the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) from seizing DNA samples from Americans arrested while peacefully protesting Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) activity.

In a complaint filed in an Illinois district court on Wednesday, protesters arrested at the Broadview ICE facility during “Operation Midway Blitz”—when thousands of federal agents flooded Chicago—demanded an injunction to stop alleged violations of the First and Fourth Amendments, as well as the Administrative Procedure Act.

They have accused the federal government of “wrongfully arresting peaceful protesters, collecting their DNA, uploading their genetic profiles to government databases, and storing their DNA samples in federal labs—permanently.”

Out of 92 non-immigration arrests at Broadview, they emphasized, only one protester was convicted. That conviction was based on pleading guilty to concealing a prior felony charge and “had nothing to do with the protests at Broadview,” the protesters said.