Protect Your Brothers and Sisters

Towards an understanding of current U.S. Government McCarthy era tactics directed against foreign born pro-Palestine student activists in a high-tech surveillance era

D.H.S. Cited Foreign Students’ Writings and Protests Before Their Arrests

Documents unsealed by a federal judge on Thursday include dossiers that investigators prepared on pro-Palestinian student activists before they were targeted for deportation.

“… While it is possible the government collected other information about the students, the records represent the information that the government presented to Judge Young to explain why the students were chosen for arrest.

“The dossiers sent to the State Department were compiled by a specialized “tiger team” in the Homeland Security Investigations arm within Immigration and Customs Enforcement. The investigations unit has traditionally looked into serious crime like human trafficking, as well as national security cases.

“Peter Hatch, an official tasked with overseeing the effort, testified during the trial last summer that the team had rushed a review of more than 5,000 students linked to pro-Palestinian demonstrations, sending their findings to Mr. Rubio’s staff for review. According to his testimony, the team’s work was also informed by reviewing lists of names compiled by at least two websites — the Canary Mission and Betar US — which identify and publish the personal information of pro-Palestinian protesters.” 

-By Zach Montague
https://www.nytimes.com/2026/01/22/us/politics/trump-rubio-student-speech.html