It Is Bigger Than You Think

Yesterday, I wrote about Trump and his never-ending appeals of his criminal convictions. But it goes deeper than that… before he died, what the judge ruled in that case is BIG if it stands. But the real threat goes far deeper than his personal legal battles, it’s about what his administration is doing to the federal court system

What is it that is so big? The judge ruled that the police and prosecutors need a warrant to search social media!

Social media surveillance case faces uncertainty after judge’s death

Three labor unions say government review of immigrants’ social media feeds violates the First Amendment. A federal judge who wrote “I agree” has died.

The Christian Science Monitor

By Varsha Bansal, Contributor

Oct. 29, 2026

The future of a lawsuit challenging the Trump administration’s right to surveil immigrants’ social media posts using artificial intelligence was thrown into doubt Wednesday following the sudden death of a federal judge who only weeks ago ruled the case could move forward.

“Plaintiffs’ allegations are of an ongoing surveillance program that is actively chilling the speech of their members and otherwise causing harm. ... I agree,” U.S. District Court Judge Alvin K. Hellerstein wrote on Oct. 1.

In the wake of Judge Hellerstein’s death, a new judge will be “randomly” assigned to his cases, according to the district executive for the Southern District of New York.

The surveillance suit, brought by three of the nation’s major labor unions, argues that the government’s monitoring of millions of visa and green card holders’ online activity is a form of “viewpoint discrimination” that violates the First Amendment. The unions say that’s already resulted in “adverse immigration action” based on the beliefs those immigrants profess.

Like I said, this is important because it limits the government's ability to go looking through “our stuff” without a warrant during witch hunts.

For now, the Trump administration’s surveillance programs will be allowed to continue. That’s because, while Judge Hellerstein allowed the case to proceed, he did not impose an injunction that immediately ordered the Trump administration to stop reviewing immigrants’ social media posts.

And now, the government is on another witch hunt—and this time, it's in homeless shelters. Digital dragnets laugh in the face of "probable cause!" Whether it is the government data-mining a homeless shelter or the feds executing secret warrants to sweep up years of a person's social media data, it smacks of “Big Brother.”

It is just like what happened in the elections. The Trump administration gave the states a list of “illegal voters.” Those lists unraveled under local investigation, with election officials finding massive numbers of clerical errors, jumbled data, and eligible U.S. citizens falsely flagged. If the states had acted on the list, thousands of legal voters would have been affected! GIGO: garbage in, garbage out!

And that is exactly what is going to happen to the homeless shelter data… it will be splashed all over the headlines: “Hundreds of illegal immigrants living right under Mamdani's nose.” But in the end, they will only find one or two, while the other accused individuals will face the nightmare of trying to prove they are U.S. citizens.