Maine Protestors Lose Bid for Order Limiting ICE Data Collection

A Maine-based group of immigration-enforcement protesters can’t block the Department of Homeland Security from collecting their biometric and other data based on their exercise of First Amendment rights.

The plaintiffs were unable to show that they were likely to succeed on the merits of their claims, a requirement for a temporary restraining order, Judge John A. Woodcock Jr. of the US District Court for the District of Maine said Monday.

Given the lack of evidence in the record to support their claims at this early stage, the court was compelled to conclude it was best resolved on a “non-emergency basis,” he said.

The lawsuit arose from allegedly retaliatory activity undertaken by Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents against Mainers protesting an immigration sweep in the state that began Jan. 20, according to the complaint.

The department’s actions triggered widespread protests and other forms of “constitutionally protected dissent,” the complaint said. The government responded by aggressively attempting to suppress protests, including by following protesters to their homes and threatening them with physical violence, it said.

Government agents also scanned the faces and license plates of protesters and stored the information in databases and watchlists that “subject the observers to additional scrutiny and harm,” it said.

The plaintiffs argued they would suffer irreparable harm absent an order restraining the government, but Woodcock said there wasn’t enough evidence before the court to justify a TRO.

The plaintiffs provided evidence that federal agents on two occasions acted contrary to formal DHS policy in response to their efforts to observe and record law enforcement activity, but not that the agents were following an informal policy and practice at the direction of DHS leadership, Woodcock said.

There also was no evidence before the court that DHS maintained a database covering protesters and observers as the plaintiffs alleged, or that their information was entered into such a database, he said.

The plaintiffs fared no better in arguing the harms they alleged were likely to recur. ICE officials disavowed the alleged conduct and said they were investigating possible discipline against the officers involved and had instructed them not to make statements in violation of DHS policy, Woodcock said.

Drummond Woodsum, Protect Democracy Project, and Dunn Isaacson Rhee LLP represent the plaintiffs and the proposed class.

The case is Hilton v. Noem, D. Me., No. 2:26-cv-00092, 3/23/26.