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Immigration authorities are collecting DNA from immigrants — including children — and feeding that information into a massive criminal database.
Most of those immigrants are not accused of committing any crime, but federal law enforcement agencies can now access their detailed DNA profiles as part of a “massive surveillance dragnet that sweeps in information about everyone,” according to a lawsuit demanding information from Donald Trump’s administration.
Monday’s lawsuit from the Georgetown Law Center on Privacy & Technology calls on the Department of Homeland Security to answer how, exactly, the agency “collects, stores and uses” those DNA samples.
Georgetown Law and two other immigration groups filed a Freedom of Information Act request for information last year. Nine months later, without any response, the groups are now suing the agency for answers.
DHS is “quickly becoming the primary contributor of DNA profiles to the nation’s criminal policing DNA database,” according to Stevie Glaberson, director of research and advocacy for Georgetown Law’s Center on Privacy & Technology.
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The Combined DNA Index System, or CODIS, is administered by the FBI. The network is used by local, state and federal enforcement agencies to match DNA from crime scenes to identify suspects.
Last year, Georgetown’s center discovered that border agents are collecting DNA from virtually anyone in their custody, no matter how long they have been detained. That information is fed into CODIS, where it lives indefinitely, “simply because they were not born in the United States,” according to Daniel Melo, an attorney with Amica Center for Immigrant Rights, which joined Georgetown’s lawsuit.
Homeland Security has added more than 1.5 million DNA profiles to the database since 2020, marking a 5,000 percent increase in submissions between 2000 and 2024, the report found.
That figure includes more than 133,000 children, according to data reviewed by Wired. Nearly 230 children are under the age of 13 and more than 30,000 were between 14 and 17 years old.
“The government’s DNA collection program represents a massive expansion of genetic surveillance and an unjustified invasion of privacy,” report author and Center on Privacy & Technology Justice Fellow Emerald Tse said at the time.
“The program reinforces harmful narratives about immigrants and intensifies existing policing practices that target immigrant communities and communities of color, making us all less safe,” Tse added.
“Americans deserve visibility on the details of this program, and the department’s lack of transparency is unacceptable,” Glaberson said Monday.
The lawsuit joins a wave of litigation against Trump’s expanding “mass deportation operation,” which is deploying officers across all federal law enforcement agencies to ramp up arrests and rapidly remove people from the country.
Emily Tucker, executive director at Georgetown Law’s Center on Privacy & Technology, said it’s a “mistake” to consider DNA collection part of “immigration enforcement.”
The president is instead relying on broad immigration authorities to justify Trump’s expansion of federal law enforcement, according to Tucker.
“This program is one part of a massive surveillance dragnet that sweeps in information about everyone,” Tucker added. “They will use it for deportation, but they will also use it to intimidate, silence, and target anyone they perceive as the enemy.”
Last week, reports emerged that the administration has deepened the federal government’s ties to Palantir, a tech firm allegedly building wide-ranging data tools to collect and surveil information for millions of Americans. Palantir — co-founded by Silicon Valley investor, Republican donor, and JD Vance mentor Peter Thiel — is reportedly working inside Homeland Security and Immigration and Customs Enforcement, among other agencies.
The administration has reportedly spent more than $113 million with Palantir through new and existing contracts, while the company is slated to begin work on a new $795 million deal with the Defense Department.
The Independent has requested comment from Homeland Security.
