1. United States
2. R.I.
3. Letter

I write to urge you to take immediate action to protect the Fourth Amendment rights of the people of the United States. The federal government is accumulating enforcement and surveillance power faster than Congress is imposing constitutional limits on its use. Executive Order 14159 directed the creation of Homeland Security Task Forces and instructed them to use “all available law enforcement tools” to execute immigration law. Later, the Department of Justice announced the first “Homeland Security Task Force New York,” co-led by Homeland Security Investigations and the FBI. Whatever the stated mission of these task forces, Congress has a duty to ensure that executive power is exercised within the Constitution, not beyond it. That duty is especially urgent because recent litigation alleges that DHS and ICE adopted a secret “Home Entry Memo” authorizing officers to force entry into homes using Form I-205 administrative warrants issued within DHS rather than warrants signed by a neutral judge. Reuters reported in January 2026 that advocates challenged this policy in federal court, and on April 2, 2026, Protect Democracy and ACLU affiliates announced another suit on behalf of both immigrants and U.S. citizens affected by the policy. If executive agencies may enter homes on their own paperwork, without prior judicial approval, then one of the core protections of the Fourth Amendment is being hollowed out. Congress must also confront the broader architecture of mass surveillance. This month, President Trump publicly urged Congress to pass a clean extension of Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, and on April 18, 2026, he signed a short-term extension through April 30. As even current reporting on the reauthorization fight makes plain, Section 702 allows intelligence agencies to collect foreign communications in ways that can also sweep in Americans’ calls, messages, and emails, which is why civil-liberties advocates continue to demand a warrant before agencies search for Americans’ communications. No serious person denies that the government needs tools to address genuine threats. But usefulness is not a substitute for legality. Even the government’s own oversight structures describe Section 702 as a powerful authority of continuing value, which is precisely why Congress must pair such power with bright-line rules, independent judicial review, strict auditing, and enforceable remedies when rights are violated. I therefore urge Congress to do the following: 1 Prohibit DHS, ICE, and all federal agents from entering homes without a judicial warrant, except in the narrow circumstances already recognized by law, such as true exigent emergencies. 2 Require a probable-cause warrant before any agency searches Section 702-acquired information for Americans’ communications. 3 Bar the government from purchasing or otherwise obtaining commercially available location, biometric, and other sensitive personal data in order to evade the warrant requirement. 4 Require robust public reporting on domestic surveillance practices, including U.S.-person queries, interagency data sharing, and use of administrative warrants. 5 Strengthen inspector-general review, whistleblower protections, and statutory remedies for unconstitutional searches and seizures. 6 Use Congress’s appropriations power to deny funding for any program or task force that operates through secret legal theories designed to bypass judicial oversight. The Fourth Amendment is not an inconvenience to be managed by executive memorandum. It is a constitutional limit on state power. Congress should not wait for courts, whistleblowers, or grieving families to do the work of restoring that limit. It should act now, clearly and decisively, to reaffirm that in the United States, the government does not get to invade the home, search private communications, or build systems of dragnet surveillance without lawful process and meaningful oversight.