The Electronic Frontier Foundation has filed a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit to disclose federal government officials communications’ with tech companies that were aimed at removing applications and webpages that helped people report on immigration enforcement activities happening in their communities. 

The lawsuit, filed in federal court in San Francisco, seeks records that would show whether officials crossed the line from communicating with tech companies into unconstitutional coercion. Federal immigration authorities’ activities throughout the country have been controversial and the subject of ongoing protests and opposition by people living in those communities. Many people have exercised their First Amendment rights to record law enforcement’s activities and to report that information to the broader public through a variety of online applications and websites. 

In October 2025, Attorney General Pam Bondi took public credit for Apple removing one application that allowed users to report activities by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) authorities,  ICEBlock. In the days following Apple and Google removed several other applications that similarly permitted users to report ICE activities. And Facebook subsequently removed a page on its site that was tracking ICE activity in the Chicago area. 

Attorney General Bondi’s public comments and the timeline of these removals raise significant questions about whether the government violated the First Amendment. In addition to the First Amendment protecting the public’s right to record police as they conduct their activities in public, it also prohibits the government from coercing a private party—such as Apple, Google, or Facebook—to remove lawful speech.

EFF’s FOIA requests seeks the documents that will show whether government officials sought to force these companies to remove lawful speech that the government could not restrict directly.