Court Blocks ICE From Acting Against Critic While First Amendment Suit Proceeds

A court has blocked the Department of Homeland Security and Immigration and Customs Enforcement from taking further action against David Streever of Rochester, New York, over an email he sent to former acting ICE Director Todd Lyons, while Streever's First Amendment lawsuit continues.

The email was harsh. Streever compared Lyons to a Nazi, called him a "monstrous human being" and predicted he would be tormented by his own conscience. In the message, he also told Lyons he "will never know peace," according to AP. Streever said he wrote after federal immigration officers fatally shot two observers in Minneapolis in January, according to NPR.

Agents came months later. Homeland Security Investigations officers contacted Streever five months after he sent the email to Lyons. ICE agents tried to track him down at his home, an airport and a hotel to confront him about the message.

At his home, agents left a warning notice stating "YOU MAY BE IN VIOLATION OF FEDERAL LAW" and listing federal laws on threatening federal officials. The complaint alleges agents also tracked Streever to a New York City hotel despite no indication he was staying there, and Streever says the hotel visit was an effort to intimidate him.

Streever sued in July, arguing ICE agents violated his First Amendment rights. He is represented by the nonprofit free speech group the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE). The lawsuit alleges the agents' actions caused him to self-censor his views. A free-speech watchdog is suing the Trump administration over ICE's actions toward Streever. FIRE attorney Adam Steinbaugh said Streever's expression was "very clearly within the protection of the First Amendment," according to PBS.

DHS defended its investigation by citing an increase in threats of violence against public officials. The federal government said its investigation into Streever was closed in late June, before he filed his lawsuit. That filing did not assert that Streever's email was a violent threat that could be prosecuted.

The court issued a preliminary injunction while the case continued so that Streever could continue to speak freely. The order blocks DHS and ICE from taking further steps in reliance on the Warning Notice against Streever. It also blocks the agencies from issuing any substantially similar threats to Streever aimed at his protected expression during the course of the matter. The ruling asked the government to turn over the report that closed its investigation of Streever.

The broader context here is procedural, not final. A preliminary injunction preserves the status quo and assesses likelihood of success, it does not resolve the underlying retaliation claim. For practitioners, the provisions to watch are the bar on reliance on the Warning Notice and the demand for the closing report. The first limits what the agencies can use the prior contact to justify going forward. The second could establish the contemporaneous record of why investigators opened the case, how they evaluated the email, and why they closed it in June. The government's position presents a tension that courts in threat-versus-criticism cases often probe: an stated concern about rising threats to officials, paired with no assertion in its filing that this particular message was a prosecutable violent threat.