On Monday, Joshua Aaron, creator of the widely used ICEBlock app — which allowed users to share real-time alerts about federal immigration enforcement sightings — filed a federal lawsuit against the Trump administration, claiming First Amendment violations after Apple pulled the app from its store.
The suit follows Apple’s October removal of ICEBlock, which had surpassed 1 million users, after the Trump administration pressured the company — an unusually direct instance of the U.S. government successfully demanding a tech platform take down an app.
Aaron said he thinks the Trump administration is not just attacking his free speech rights, but those of all citizens when it goes after apps like ICEBlock, and that he hoped his lawsuit helps stop the administration “from eroding the Constitution.”
“When we see our government doing something wrong, it’s our duty as citizens of this nation to hold them accountable, and that is exactly what we’re doing with this lawsuit,” Aaron said.
The Justice Department, the Department of Homeland Security, and the White House did not immediately respond to requests for comment on Aaron’s suit. Apple, which is not named as a defendant, also did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
When it removed the app from its store, Apple said it took action based on information from law enforcement about safety risks. The Justice Department confirmed that it had contacted Apple to pull the app, and Bondi said in a statement at the time that ICEBlock was designed to put ICE agents at risk, which the developer strongly disputes.
The app, which is still functioning for people who downloaded it before its removal from app stores, allows users to report publicly observable activity of federal immigration agents and their locations.
The suit cites a message Apple sent to Aaron that said “information provided to Apple by law enforcement” showed that his app violated the company’s guidelines “because its purpose is to provide location information about law enforcement officers that can be used to harm such officers individually or as a group.”
MacDailyNews Take: Congress, not Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), wrote U.S. immigration law.
ICE agents are federal law-enforcement officers whose job is to enforce the rules that the U.S. Congress wrote and the president signed.
Congress has decided who may enter, how they must enter, how long they can stay, and what happens if someone enters or stays illegally. Those decisions are codified in Title 8 of the U.S. Code and related statutes.
The laws that ICE agents are following today were overwhelmingly written and passed by the 104th Congress (1995–1996) and signed by U.S. President Bill Clinton in 1996.
The ICEBlock app enables anonymous crowdsourced reporting of ICE agent sightings within a 5-mile radius, alerting users in real-time to evade enforcement actions. This crowdsourced tracking effectively doxxes federal officers, exposing their locations during operations and potentially enabling ambushes or harassment, as evidenced by a reported 500% surge in assaults on ICE agents in 2025.
As we wrote back in October when ICEBlock was pulled the Apple’s App Store, “It never should have been in the App Store in the first place.”
Officials, including Attorney General Pam Bondi and ICE Acting Director Todd Lyons, have condemned the ICEBlock app as a direct threat to law enforcement lives — likening it to providing “a hitman the location of their target” — with real-world links to incidents like the Dallas ICE facility shooting where the perpetrator used similar apps.
Laws are changed only one constitutional way: a majority in the House and 60 votes in the Senate (or a simple majority with budget reconciliation) pass a new bill, and the president signs it — or Congress overrides a veto.
Any official (including ICE agents, judges, or even the President) who decides to selectively ignore or not enforce an existing law they personally dislike is breaking their oath of office and violating the Constitution’s command that the President (and by extension his officers) “shall take Care that the Laws be faithfully executed” (Article II, Section 3).
If the majority of people want different immigration rules, they have to win elections, control Congress, write the new law, and get it signed — exactly what happened in 1996 when reformers did precisely that and created today’s enforcement system. There is no legal shortcut that lets bureaucrats, activists, or local officials nullify a federal statute just because they don’t like it. That’s just lawlessness.
If you think it’s too difficult to win elections, control Congress, write the new law, and get it signed, you’re likely not in the majority on that issue – as an October 2025 Harvard/Harris poll bears out, finding 56% of U.S. citizens support deporting all illegal aliens and 78% support deporting illegal aliens with criminal records.
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Except that ICE has been caught, again and again, lying, arresting legal immigrants, and even arresting US citizens with ZERO probable cause. Even illegal immigrants have due process rights, and habeas corpus has not been suspended despite the bluster of Pam Bondi.
For example, in early December a federal judge ordered DHS to stop conducting warrantless immigration arrests without probable cause in Washington, D.C. The DHS must clarify to all federal agents that probable cause, not mere “reasonable suspicion,” is the appropriate standard on which to base arrests.
In November, a federal judge in Chicago ordered the release of over 600 detainees from ICE custody after finding that immigration officers had failed to establish probable cause in their arrests as required under federal law, and in violation of a 2022 consent decree stemming from similar behavior during Trump’s first term.
Leo Garcia Venegas, a U.S. citizen was detained twice during construction site raids in Alabama, despite having a valid state ID on him.
After a video of a Chicago-area teenager being violently arrested went viral earlier this month, McLaughlin (DHS) wrote on X that the video was “from a year ago” and that the agents involved weren’t ICE. Both claims were false.
ICE has significantly increased arrests at scheduled interviews and appointments held at U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) field offices for LEGAL immigrants. These include interviews for immigration benefits such as lawful permanent residency (green cards), naturalization, asylum, and even routine ICE check-ins. These people are following the law, contributing to the economy, paying taxes, paying Social security, and chasing the American dream.
“Again and again.” By that you seem to mean twice. Regardless, there are legal mechanisms to correct whatever you’re alleging, without proof, of course.
I’ll make it easy for you: Anyone here illegally has broken immigration law and are subject to possible deportation. Anyone here legally has not broken immigration law and are therefore not subject to deportation.
An order from a “federal judge?” Seriously? See you at SCOTUS – where you’ll lose. These are Soros judges, installed by an anti-American multi-billionaire and his spawn.
As MDN explained quite clearly above, “the laws that ICE agents are following today were overwhelmingly written and passed by the 104th Congress (1995–1996) and signed by U.S. President Bill Clinton in 1996.”
Still waiting for Melania Trump and Baron Trump to be deported back to Slovakia. Melania was NOT an American citizen when Baron was born.
Melania Trump is not in the U.S. illegally. She is a naturalized U.S. citizen, having completed the process on July 28, 2006, after obtaining lawful permanent residency on March 19, 2001, via an EB-1 visa. Prior to that, she entered the U.S. legally in August 1996 on a B-1/B-2 visitor visa and transitioned to H-1B work visas starting in October 1996, which authorized her employment.
Baron Trump is not in the U.S. illegally. He was born on March 20, 2006, at New York Hospital Medical Center in New York City. Like his mother, he is also a U.S. citizen.
Illegal…look it up.
Illegal aliens have no due process rights and they have to be kicked out as quickly and mercilessly as possible.
Anyone who tries to impede ICE from doing their job should be arrested and prosecuted for sedition and brought before a firing squad.
Valid laws can be immorally and cruelly enforced. There’s a reason prosecutorial and administrative discretion exists. Trump did well to shut down the border but he should’ve stuck to going after illegals in JAIL or who have committed crimes not those who are living decent lives. I work in a real estate broker’s office and one of our best sales reps, a Venezuelan lady, is about to get deported—she’s been in the industry for 15 years and has never committed a crime.
Can you imagine if we enforced the Tax Code with the same vigor as we’re currently enforcing immigration law? Hire an army of 100,000 auditors to review every expense and deduction you’ve ever taken? It’s all authorized by law—but would it be JUST?
Ask yourself why she never bothered to go through the legal process to become a citizen? This isn’t America’s fault.
It is not the best time to criticize the «lie» while the king-president himself is the first to use lies as a foundation of his leadership.
But, as everyone knows, freedom is only tolerated when it bends to the will of the king.