As ICE Tracking Apps Head to Court, a Dallas Activist Group Takes Watch

In recent months, the Department of Justice has encouraged technology companies and social media moderators to ban apps and groups that share information about the locations and activities of Immigration and Customs Enforcement Agents, stating that the grassroots campaigns are being used to promote violence against law enforcement officials. 

Despite these crackdowns, the DFW Brown Berets remain undeterred. The Latino Civil Rights group utilizes social media and encrypted messaging services, such as Signal and WhatsApp, to broadcast verified sightings of ICE agents across North Texas. The group launched the system earlier this year in response to President Donald Trump’s promised immigration crackdown, which has brought swells of ICE agents into North Texas communities. 

“Everybody has the right to information. And this is information that is safeguarding families, safeguarding people,” said Esperanza Tomeo, an organizer with the group. 

According to the Texas Tribune, one in four immigrants arrested by ICE this year was detained in Texas, and daily arrests have doubled under the Trump Administration.

While the Brown Berets use social media to broadcast ICE agent sightings, Tomeo said the network has increasingly relied on encrypted messaging apps because the groups can’t be monitored or shut down by technology companies. She said the group receives dozens of tips a day — everything from blurry photos to Ring camera footage — from community members who observe ICE agents and vehicles across North Texas. A Brown Berets community member is then dispatched to verify the sightings before the agent locations are shared with the community network. 

That verification is essential, Tomeo said, to help prevent unnecessary alarm among the undocumented and immigrant community. She said the ICE alerts affect “how people go about their day,” and that North Texans have come to depend on the Brown Berets’ alerts to avoid interactions with immigration officials. The group regularly receives inquiries from community members about whether agents have been spotted in a particular area before they embark on errands or chores. 

“We’re not here to cause fear within people. We want them to be able to operate on their daily [schedules],” she said. “At least people know to be cautious in certain areas. It’s not saying don’t go there, don’t do this, but it’s so that they are aware of their surroundings when they go to certain areas.” 

In recent months, the group has witnessed a ramp-up in immigration enforcement in predominantly Hispanic areas such as Pleasant Grove, Mesquite and Webb Chapel. Until this fall, information on those movements was more readily available to the public. 

ICEBlock was one of a handful of apps that tracked the sightings and movements of ICE agents and was removed from the App Store in October, after federal officials claimed that the channels posed a threat to law enforcement officers by sharing the images and locations of agents in real-time. After a sniper shot at a van outside of the Dallas ICE field office in September, FBI Director Kash Patel announced that the man had used “apps that tracked the presence of ICE agents” to develop an attack plan. (Ultimately, the only people harmed in the attack were ICE detainees.) 

The creator of ICEBlock is now suing the Trump administration. He claims that officials violated his First Amendment rights by pressuring Apple to remove his app from the App Store, and that the Justice Department overstepped its jurisdiction in doing so. 

Attorney General Pam Bondi has openly encouraged technology companies and social media moderators to stifle pages and platforms that broadcast ICE agent movements. In October, Facebook’s parent company, Meta, shut down an 80,000-member group called ICE Sighting-Chicagoland, claiming that the page violated Meta’s “policies against coordinated harm.” The Brown Beret’s social media account has not been targeted by Meta, and other ICE-tracking social media pages have been largely unaffected by the Meta crackdown.

Still, as officials take swings at this type of monitoring, Tomeo said the Brown Berets have been able to sustain their tracking program because the group’s members are already ingrained in the community. She denies that the effort is being done to harm law enforcement agents, as Trump administration officials claim. 

“What we are doing is for the protection of the people that local government and ICE agents are targeting,” said Tomeo. “They’re hunting our people down. We are protecting them, and so we have a right to defend.”