D.Mass.: Use of confidential taxpayer information to conduct immigration arrests and entries is enjoined

The use of confidential taxpayer information by ICE for immigration raids without any statutorily required procedures is enjoined. There is also the problem of no judicial warrant from judicial officer, just an immigration judge if at all. Cmty. Econ. Dev. Ctr. of Se. Mass. v. Bessent, 2026 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 24212 (D. Mass. Feb. 5, 2026)*:

Misidentifications due to administrative error also present significant danger to citizens and noncitizens alike given the DHS General Counsel’s opinion that “illegal aliens aren’t entitled to the same Fourth Amendment protections as U.S. citizens.” Jimmy Percival, How the Deep State Thwarted Ice Administrative Warrants, Wall Street J. (Jan. 22, 2026). The DHS General Counsel described ICE’s practice to use administrative warrants (i.e. warrants signed by an Immigration Judge rather than a federal magistrate or district judge) to enter noncitizens’ homes and arrest them. Id. The DHS General Counsel claimed this practice is lawful because “[a]liens in this context are fugitives from justice[.]” Id. Given the high potential for misidentification, ICE’s arrests and detention practices (including, as affirmed by DHS counsel, the misapprehension that homes of individuals suspected to be noncitizens may be searched without a judicial warrant), and the absence of procedural safeguards, the court finds that the public interest is not served by ICE’s use of the confidential taxpayer information provided despite ICE’s failure to satisfy the statutorily required procedures for obtaining such information.

Third and finally, the government has failed to show that the provision of taxpayer addresses is integral to law enforcement, let alone to the President’s promise to start enforcement with the “worst of the worst.” As discussed above, Defendants failed to identify in their request to the IRS, and have offered no further demonstration here, how the use of taxpayer addresses serves ICE in its efforts to prosecute specific criminal offenders under 8 U.S.C. § 1253. The court finds no basis to conclude that enjoining the data-sharing, until that sharing complies with the law and includes statutorily-mandated procedural protections, will interfere with ICE’s ability to enforce the law. See Ala. Ass’n of Realtors v. Dep’t of Health and Human Servs., 594 U.S. 758, 766 (2021) (“[O]ur system does not permit agencies to act unlawfully even in pursuit of desirable ends.”); see also Ctr. for Taxpayer Rights, 2025 WL 3251044, at *38 (describing the likelihood that plaintiffs’ “members’ address information will be impermissibly used for civil immigration enforcement” as an “imminent risk.”).