Lawmaker: Apple Cooperated With Trump Administration to Pull ICE-Tracking Apps
Rep. Jamie Raskin says Apple has no evidence to justify removing ICE-tracking apps like ICEBlock and accuses the company of helping the government censor Americans' rights to record its activities.
US Representative Jamie Raskin (D-Md.) has accused Apple of working with the Trump administration to remove apps that tracked Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) activity, including ICEBlock, from the App Store. In a letter sent Monday and reported by CNN, Raskin said Apple has produced no evidence supporting government claims that such apps endangered ICE officers.
Raskin alleges Apple has cited immigrant deaths unrelated to the apps to justify what he calls censorship of Americans exercising their right to record and report on government activity, suggesting the company may be violating customers' First Amendment rights.
Background
Raskin had pressed Apple for answers for months. In July, the company finally told him that ICEBlock and other apps were removed following a fatal shooting at a Dallas ICE facility that left two detainees dead. The shooter, Joshua Jahn, fired indiscriminately into the building before killing himself, leaving notes expressing hope that his actions would instill fear of being shot among ICE agents. At the time, US Attorney for the Northern District of Texas Nancy Larson noted the "tragic irony" that a detainee, not an ICE officer, was killed in the attack.
Since then, the Department of Homeland Security and FBI Director Kash Patel have characterized the shooting as evidence that agents are being targeted. DHS frequently cites an internal October 2025 statistic claiming an 8,000 percent increase in death threats against ICE officers, but has not released data allowing independent verification of that figure.
Patel has also claimed the Dallas shooter searched for apps tracking ICE agents' locations. Raskin disputed this, telling Apple there is no evidence the shooter used any ICE-tracking app — and that even if he had, he would not have needed one to find a fixed government building's address, which he reportedly located using a standard app built into Apple devices.
