The government wants to scare Americans out of sharing the news

Federal officials have repeatedly claimed that criticizing immigration officials or identifying officers is unlawful and dangerous, despite clear First Amendment protections for both. Now, the government appears to be taking a disturbing new step: investigating Americans for posting information on social media that originally appeared in news reports.

This tactic allows the government to kill two birds with one stone: censoring individual critics and limiting the reach of the press. If the government can deter people from sharing news reports through threats of investigation or prosecution, it can undermine the public impact of journalism without ever censoring a newsroom directly.

Local news outlet Syracuse.com reported last month that federal agents tracked down a New York woman to demand she remove a social media post that they claimed threatened Immigration and Customs Enforcement personnel. Agents confronted the woman, Paigelynne Gonyea, where she worked at a polling place and demanded she sign a form letter stating she could be criminally prosecuted for threatening a federal officer.

Gonyea told Syracuse.com that she believed agents were referring to a January Instagram post “where she named the ICE agent who shot protester Renee Good.” In the post, Gonyea shared a picture of the agent, Jonathan Ross, that The Minnesota Star Tribune used in its news report first identifying him as the shooter.

Gonyea wrote, “BREAKING: The ICE agent who shot and killed Renee Good in broad daylight has been identified as Jonathan Ross by the Minnesota Star Tribune. I think today is a great day for Jonathan to be indicted!”

The Department of Homeland Security later told The Associated Press that Gonyea also posted Ross’ home address, and a spokeswoman shared with the AP reporter a different, redacted social media post purporting to come from Gonyea’s account. But Gonyea denied posting Ross’ address, and DHS has not made the alleged post publicly available. Gonyea also told NPR that agents who came to the polling station had a copy of her Instagram post with the photo of Ross, which does not include his address.

Freedom of the Press Foundation (FPF) has filed a Freedom of Information Act request with ICE’s Office of Professional Responsibility, which investigated Gonyea and other incidents it claims amounted to illegal “doxxing” of ICE agents. We’re seeking records about whether the investigations of Gonyea and others are based on people reposting information from news outlets, or have otherwise targeted journalism.

These records should be made public, especially because the agents’ legal warnings to Gonyea closely track similar threats the federal government has made to journalists. Administration officials have repeatedly claimed that journalists who photograph or name ICE officers are doxxing officers, inciting violence, or even committing violence. The First Amendment, however, protects publishing truthful, lawfully obtained information and photographing officers in public, whether it’s done by journalists or others.

In addition, if Gonyea is right that agents confronted her over an Instagram post repeating information from the Tribune, then the government’s actions may reveal a new way it’s trying to suppress reporting. DHS may not be able to censor reporting by chilling journalists, but it can suppress the news if it can scare people out of reposting it.

Another of the administration’s favorite tricks, intimidating journalists’ sources, stops newsgathering before it starts. But when a story slips through the cracks, bullying those who share it offers a censorship backup plan.

This strategy also allows DHS to avoid directly confronting news outlets and journalists, who are better positioned to fight back against unconstitutional censorship orders or other First Amendment violations. Regular people are more likely to be dissuaded by the threat of criminal prosecution and less likely to bring court cases that can result in precedent that checks government power.

This undermines journalism’s ability to hold power accountable. Freedom of the press means little if no one can talk about a news story because they’re scared they’ll go to jail.

We must also remain vigilant against other ways that the government may be going around journalists and outlets to suppress news published online. Gonyea’s experience raises the disturbing possibility that the government could be pressuring tech platforms to remove posts by people that reference news reports about ICE by claiming that they’re illegal.

The Department of Justice has already coerced Facebook into removing at least one group that allowed people to report sightings of federal agents, arguing that it was inciting violence. It also pressured Apple and Google into removing ICE tracking apps based on similarly spurious claims.

We don’t know whether this has happened in cases involving other types of online content, including with demands to remove posts that simply repeat information from news reports, because these requests are often invisible to the public.

News outlets may raise alarms when platforms remove their reporting, but individual users are less likely to publicly object if their posts citing a news story are removed. Platforms’ transparency reports are too vague and high level to shed light on these demands. FOIA requests about the government’s demands for platforms can help, but often only if you have the ability to sue.

Whether the government quietly coerces platforms into removing individual posts about the news or loudly pressures individual Americans into taking them down themselves, the effect is the same: The public’s ability to see, share, and discuss reporting that holds officials accountable is limited.

These tactics must be recognized as a threat to press freedom, even if they don’t directly involve a newsroom. Freedom of the press can’t end when the news story is published. Defending a free press means defending everyone’s right to participate in the public conversation that allows that journalism to spread.