Laura Berlin built a public database showing which companies, banks and contractors profit from immigration enforcement. Activists used it to pressure Citizens Bank and other firms. Then a federal intelligence bulletin labeled the website a possible tool for domestic extremism, turning a transparency project into a national debate over protest, surveillance and the limits of dissent.
AUSTIN/WASHINGTON | Filed at 7:20 p.m. ET
Laura Berlin did not begin with a protest outside a bank branch. She began with a question. Who is making money from ICE?
That question, ordinary enough for a civics class and uncomfortable enough for Washington, became the basis of an interactive online database titled “Who is Profiting from ICE?” Berlin, a Texas mother with a background in nonprofit communications, built the site after watching images of immigration enforcement and deportation operations under President Donald Trump’s second administration. She wanted to know which companies owned the detention facilities, which firms flew deportation flights, which banks financed private prison operators and which vendors supplied the infrastructure behind the federal government’s expanded immigration crackdown.
The project was simple in form: public records, corporate filings, contracts, maps and names. Its consequences were not simple.
Activists found Berlin’s site and used it as a roadmap for a pressure campaign against Citizens Bank, which had financial ties to GEO Group and CoreCivic, two of the largest private prison and immigration detention contractors in the United States. Protests spread across states. Customers pledged withdrawals. Local governments joined the pressure. Jersey City moved to divest $265 million from Citizens Bank. Montclair, New Jersey, voted to withdraw roughly $90 million more. By July, Citizens Bank said it would exit lending relationships with GEO Group and CoreCivic. Then the federal government found the website too.
According to a secret Department of Homeland Security intelligence bulletin obtained by USA TODAY, Berlin’s website was flagged as information that could be used by anti-ICE threat actors, including local anarchist extremists, to escalate from peaceful direct action into vandalism or violence. The bulletin reportedly used a Homeland Security information category previously used for domestic terrorism related intelligence and acknowledged that some of the described activity involved First Amendment protected conduct. That is the story’s collision point.
A mother built a public accountability tool from public information. Activists used it to organize protests and economic pressure. A major bank changed course. Homeland Security treated the site as part of a threat picture. The country now has to decide what it sees.
The government’s position rests on a real concern. Violence against law enforcement officers and federal facilities is not imaginary. DHS and the FBI have warned in recent months about attacks on ICE facilities and personnel by domestic violent extremists, including people who claimed to be responding to immigration enforcement. Federal officers have been targeted. Facilities have faced threats. Protest environments can be exploited by people seeking confrontation. No serious civil liberties argument requires ignoring actual violence or credible threats.
But the danger in the Berlin case is not that DHS monitors threats. It is that the line between threat assessment and political surveillance appears to be moving closer to ordinary dissent.
That line matters because the material at issue was not a bomb manual, a weapons cache, a private home address or a plan to attack agents. It was a searchable map and campaign resource showing companies, agencies, politicians and financial institutions connected to ICE. Much of that information came from government databases and corporate records. The site did not invent the contracts. It made them easier to see. Transparency can make powerful people uncomfortable. That is not the same as violence.
The federal bulletin reportedly did not accuse Berlin of committing a crime. It did not publicly identify a specific violent act she directed. It did not show that her site itself caused an attack. Instead, it appears to have framed the website as a tool that could be used by others in a broader climate of anti-ICE activism. That kind of logic can become very broad very quickly.
A protest calendar could be used by someone who vandalizes property. A news article could be used by someone who harasses a public official. A campaign finance database could be used by someone who targets donors. A corporate map could be used by someone planning a boycott, a picket line, a sit-in or a crime. The possibility of misuse cannot by itself turn public information into extremist infrastructure. Democracy depends on the ability to follow the money.
That phrase is not radical. It is the basis of oversight. Journalists follow money. Watchdog groups follow money. Prosecutors follow money. Congressional investigators follow money. Shareholders follow money. Citizens follow money because public policy is not only made by elected officials. It is also made through contracts, banks, vendors, investors and private companies that profit when government priorities change.
ICE is no exception
The Trump administration’s immigration expansion has created a large market for detention, surveillance, transportation, technology, staffing, data analytics and facility operations. Private firms do not merely observe that expansion. Many help make it operational. GEO Group and CoreCivic provide detention capacity. Airlines and charter companies can move detainees. Technology companies can help agencies identify, track or process people. Banks and investors can provide capital. Local governments can sign detention or enforcement agreements. The deportation system is not only a set of raids. It is an industry. Berlin’s website made that industry visible.
The most tangible result was the Citizens Bank campaign. Berlin’s research and the De-ICE Citizens Bank Coalition helped turn a financial relationship into a public controversy. Organizers argued that Citizens was helping finance private prison companies profiting from ICE detention. Citizens defended its broader community reputation and later said its decision to exit current credit facilities with GEO and CoreCivic was a business decision based on changed commercial circumstances, not a statement about those companies’ operations. The distinction is important, but the effect was clear. Public pressure moved a bank.
That is why this case matters beyond immigration policy. It shows that activists no longer need a national organization, a famous leader or a large budget to challenge corporate participation in government systems. They need public data, a clear target, a website, local organizers and enough moral urgency to move depositors, cities and institutions. That is the new protest economy.
It is decentralized, data driven and reputational. It does not always ask Washington to change first. It asks banks, contractors, universities, pension funds, city councils and customers to stop participating. For companies, that can feel like coercion. For activists, it is ordinary democratic pressure. For law enforcement, it becomes difficult to separate lawful protest from the small number of people who might use protest moments for unlawful acts.
That difficulty does not justify treating a public records project as a national threat.
DHS has a duty to protect agents and facilities. It also has a duty not to chill lawful dissent. When a federal agency places protest research inside an intelligence bulletin, even with caveats about First Amendment activity, it sends a message to organizers: the government is watching you. That message may deter violence. It may also deter peaceful speech, research and association. The First Amendment problem is not theoretical.
A person who knows her website is being circulated in a federal intelligence bulletin may stop publishing. A volunteer may avoid attending a bank protest. A city council member may hesitate to support divestment. A donor may avoid a legal advocacy group. A researcher may stop compiling public contracting data. The government does not need to prosecute everyone to change behavior. Sometimes a label is enough. That is why labels matter.
Calling something a threat does not merely describe risk. It changes how police departments, fusion centers, corporate security teams and local officials respond. A website that might otherwise be viewed as a public accountability tool can become suspicious. Activists can become subjects. Protest can become a security problem before anything unlawful occurs. The federal government should be careful with that power.
The Philadelphia Police Department, which USA TODAY reported supplied information to DHS, said bulletins are intended for situational awareness and not to characterize lawful activity as criminal. DHS said information from local partners helps sharpen the national threat picture. Those statements are worth noting. They reflect the government’s attempt to frame the bulletin as caution, not accusation. But caution can still overreach.
The public has seen this pattern before. After major protests, law enforcement agencies often expand monitoring in the name of preventing violence. Some monitoring is legitimate. Some has later been criticized as sweeping up political activity, social media posts, religious communities, racial justice organizing, environmental activism or anti-war protest. The question is not whether government should ignore threats. It is whether it can distinguish threats from dissent with discipline. The Berlin case suggests that distinction is under strain.
There is also a deeper political context. Immigration enforcement has become one of the most aggressive and profitable areas of federal policy. AP reported last week that ICE arrests rose to nearly 50,000 in July, the highest monthly total of Trump’s second term. The Washington Post has reported that ICE has gained major new surveillance tools and spending power as the administration expands deportation operations. Private detention companies and immigration contractors have told investors that federal enforcement creates major business opportunities. In that environment, following the money is not a fringe act. It is a public interest function.
The people targeted by immigration enforcement are often among the least able to see or challenge the system around them. Detainees may not know which company operates the facility. Families may not know which contractor moved a loved one. Voters may not know which bank finances expansion. Shareholders may not know the political exposure of a holding. Local officials may not know their public funds sit in institutions financing detention firms. A map can give those people a starting point.
That does not mean every company on such a map is guilty of wrongdoing. It does not mean every contractor supports every policy. Some provide ordinary services under lawful contracts. Some began contracts under previous administrations. Some may dispute how activists describe their role. Some may provide services that would exist under any immigration system. Fair reporting should distinguish direct detention operations, financing, technology support, transportation, public contracts and indirect investment exposure. Accuracy matters because transparency loses force when it becomes careless.
But the answer to possible errors is correction, not surveillance branding. Companies should be able to dispute listings. Activists should be willing to update data. Journalists should verify. Public agencies should release better contracting information. None of that requires treating a public map as a domestic terrorism concern unless it crosses into threats, incitement or unlawful targeting. That is the essential democratic balance.
The government can investigate threats. Companies can defend their contracts. Activists can organize boycotts. Journalists can examine the evidence. Courts can protect rights. Citizens can decide where to bank, shop, invest and protest.
What cannot happen in a healthy democracy is for public records research to become suspect because it is effective.
Berlin’s website became powerful precisely because it connected abstract policy to names and money. It showed that mass immigration enforcement is not only carried out by uniformed agents. It is carried by contracts, credit lines, corporate services and local decisions. That made the system visible enough to challenge. Visibility is not violence. It is accountability.
The federal government may argue that visibility can expose targets. That concern deserves careful handling when private addresses, personal details or tactical movements are involved. But corporate contracting relationships and public financing ties are not private secrets in the same way. They are part of the public consequences of doing business with the government. When companies profit from public policy, they should expect public scrutiny.
The hardest part of this story is that both danger and rights are real. There have been threats and attacks around ICE. There is also a constitutional right to protest ICE, criticize contractors, urge boycotts and publish public information about government spending. A democratic government must respond to violence without turning opposition into extremism by default. That is the test DHS now faces.
It can protect officers and facilities while making clear that public contracting research is lawful. It can pursue credible threats without chilling peaceful organizing. It can separate doxxing from accountability journalism. It can tell local partners to distinguish violent planning from boycotts, petitions, protests and maps made from public records. Or it can keep blurring the line until every effective critic becomes a potential threat.
Berlin says she is not stopping. According to USA TODAY, she plans to keep highlighting companies tied to ICE, including firms that gather data used to identify and locate immigrants. That next phase may be even more sensitive because immigration enforcement increasingly relies on surveillance technology. It will also be even more important.
The state has more power than any mother with a website. That is exactly why the website matters.
Reporting and sourcing transparency note: This article is based on current public reporting from USA TODAY, the Associated Press, The Washington Post, CBS News, city records from Jersey City, Citizens Bank related reporting, Boycott Citizens public materials and public reporting on ICE contractors, immigration detention, protest activity and federal threat bulletins.
Civil liberties and public safety information note: This article is for news and public information only. Allegations about federal surveillance, protest activity, corporate contracting and threats may change as additional documents, court records or agency statements emerge.