In February 2026, federal prosecutors twice asked a magistrate judge in Minnesota for warrants to obtain YouTube account information for journalists Georgia Fort and Don Lemon, who have pleaded not guilty to charges over a January protest at a Minneapolis church they were covering (see Trump DOJ Arrests Four Including Journalists Don Lemon and Georgia Fort). The judge refused, finding no probable cause, and wanted the journalists told so they could object. The government withdrew the requests by late March.
Less than a month later, the Department of Homeland Security went around the court, the Guardian reported. It served Google with an administrative summons under 19 U.S.C. 1509, a customs provision for checking whether import duties are paid, which requires only a DHS official's sign-off and instructed Google to keep it secret. Google refused: “For this specific admin subpoena, we pushed back and did not end up producing on it,” a spokesperson told the Minnesota Spokesman-Recorder. T-Mobile complied. It handed over six months of Fort's phone records, more than 10,000 calls and text messages, and she was not told until mid-July, when government lawyers produced them to her lawyers. DHS also sought YouTube account information for Democracy Now, the conservative podcaster Megyn Kelly, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel and an independent journalist.
Former DHS officials said the law does not fit. Chris Duncan, a former DHS lawyer: “These laws have absolutely nothing to do with a domestic situation at a church, a social media post, even an immigration matter.” John Roth, DHS inspector general from 2014 to 2017: “It's outrageous conduct on so many levels. It's hard to know where to begin.” Caitlin Vogus of the Freedom of the Press Foundation: “There is no judge in the loop.” The Justice Department and DHS declined to comment. The summonses continue a pattern of judge-free DHS demands aimed at critics (see DHS Uses 'Judge-Free' Administrative Subpoenas to Unmask and Intimidate Trump Critics and People Documenting ICE Operations).