DHS Facial Recognition Software Used Against Minnesota 15

Minneapolis, MN — Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) has deployed an aggressive facial recognition apparatus for monitoring and tracking domestic political dissidents, raising questions about why an agency created after 9/11 to fight the global war on terrorism is now maintaining centralized dossiers on ordinary American protesters.

Four days after federal agents shot and killed Alex Pretti in Minneapolis during Operation Metro Surge, HSI began Operation Puppet Master, their undercover spying campaign that netted conspiracy charges against 15 people who allegedly took part in protesting against ICE.

An HSI undercover agent, embedded inside the Signal group chat Whipple Watch, downloaded a selfie posted by Isaac Sant.

The photo shows Sant’s face bruised from rubber bullets. The agent uploaded the selfie to Clearview AI’s facial recognition database that turned it into a dossier.

Screenshot of a report titled DHS – ICE – HSI: Clearview AI Face Search Results prepared on Jan. 21, 2026 which features an image of MN15 defendant Isaac Sant. Page 1 of 8, document 212-29 of the exhibits from a motion of discovery by Sant’s legal team.

“I was dismayed, but I wasn’t surprised,” Sant said. “HSI are a bunch of bozos and Keystone Cops that don’t know what the hell they’re doing.”

Kevin Riach, Sant’s attorney, revealed the breadth of the sprawling surveillance campaign, which targeted not the agents who shot and killed Alex Pretti, but protesters, union members, and activists who organized at churches, schools, and libraries.

Clearview AI boasts that its software can scrape over 30 billion images shared openly across various dead links and social media platforms, oftentimes without the consent of those photographed.

Riach said the government produced only a fraction of the Clearview AI facial recognition search results it generated on protesters and activists during Operation Metro Surge, arguing that all results should be disclosed.

“HSI employed Clearview AI as an investigative tool in this case,” Riach wrote. “The government has produced only two Clearview AI search results related to Project Whipple Shield and Operation Puppet Master.”

“It’s indicative of the type of sweeping dragnet surveillance that they’re putting the entire community under,” said Sant.

“This case involves an unprecedented campaign by DHS to spy on Minnesotans. During Operation Metro Surge, undercover agents posing as protesters surveilled community meetings at churches, parks, libraries, schools and union halls. These agents surreptitiously recorded dozens of conversations with ordinary people who were simply exercising their First Amendment right to protest ICE’s lawless rampage in our state. The agents gathered information about Minnesotans from law enforcement databases and internet searches, and created dossiers that are apparently now available agency-wide.”
Kevin Riach, attorney for MN15 defendant, in the his motion for discovery submitted Aug. 13, 2026

Clearview, the New York-based facial recognition firm provides its database to thousands of local police departments and signed a $3 million contract with DHS in the fall of 2025.

Clearview AI’s search results are far from perfect. A 50-year-old woman from Tennessee sat in jail for more than three months after Clearview matched her image with a bank fraud suspect in Fargo.

“A woman used a fake military ID to steal tens of thousands of dollars from banks in Fargo. The cops ran surveillance footage through facial recognition software. That Al software said it was me,” Angela Lipps wrote on her GoFundMe that has since raised $90,000. “A detective looked at my Tennessee driver’s license and my social media and agreed. Nobody called me. Nobody asked me a single question. They just got a warrant.”

Police arrested Randall Reid the day after Thanksgiving, accusing him of stealing designer hand bags in Louisiana.

“I’m locked up for something I have no clue about,” Reid told the New York Times.

Sant and his lawyer, Riach, said Clearview produced a false match in Sant’s case, linking Facebook photos of another man, his wife and their family to Sant.

“The report generated for Mr. Sant includes results “accepted” as matches to Mr. Sant that are clearly not him,” Riach wrote to the judge. “For example, Page 8 of the Clearview AI results for Mr. Sant contain photos of another man and his family, including the man’s pregnant wife and young daughter, pulled from that man’s Facebook page and now inextricably linked with Mr. Sant in HSI’s internal databases.”

Screenshot of the Clearview AI face search results of MN15 defendant Isaac Sant and linking him to an unrelated person that is not Sant. Image from page 8 of 8, document 212-29 of the exhibits from a motion of discovery by Sant’s legal team.

Privacy advocates have called for a ban on facial recognition technology.

“This sounds like a clear example of how facial recognition can be dangerous when its identification is faulty,” Reem Suleiman, campaign director at Fight For the Future said. “But facial recognition can be just as dangerous even when it’s accurate.”

Sant said he had no relation to the family in the false match.

“They’re spying on some guy that’s not even related to me, that a computer thinks looks like me,” said Sant.

“If you ask me, I think this whole indictment was written by AI and the whole thing’s going to get thrown out.”
Isaac Sant, one of the Minnesota 15 accused of conspiring against the U.S.

Isaac Sant, one of the Minnesota 15 accused of conspiracy against the government for anti-ICE protests, spoke to UR a week after being arrested by federal agents. Watch the interview here.

Suleiman described facial recognition as a threat to democracy.

“ICE agents should not be able to scan peoples’ faces in public or use dragnet surveillance tools to intimidate protesters and stifle dissent,” said Suleiman.

“We can see so clearly how these tools have been used selectively to crack down on activists and the political dissidents like those in Minneapolis, which makes these tools a direct threat to democracy and our collective ability to protest safely.”
Reem Suleiman, campaign director at Fight For the Future

“ICE and DHS have no regard for Americans’ First Amendment rights, let alone concern about the inaccuracy of their spyware,” said Surveillance Technology Oversight Project (S.T.O.P.) Executive Director Michelle Dahl.

“Clearview AI built its massive database from scraping billions of people’s social media images without consent. It’s horrifying but not at all surprising the company is being used by ICE and DHS to intimidate protesters and crush dissent. Especially with a database this vast, there will only be more false Clearview AI matches unless Congress steps in and bans ICE’s use of facial recognition.”
Michelle Dahl, Surveillance Technology Oversight Project (S.T.O.P.) Executive Director

The facial recognition search results on Sant’s bruised selfie turned up images from past protests:

Sant at 1000 Durbans International Climate Justice Day rally in Los Angeles, 15 years ago December 3, 2011
Sant holding a sign quoting labor organizer August Spies last words at a demonstration supporting Chelsea Manning 13 years ago at Fort Meade.
Sant with filmmaker Boots Riley at Johns Hopkins University after releasing the dark comedy film Sorry to Bother You.
A photo of his arrest at the Disrupt J20 inauguration protests on Jan. 20, 2017 published in Buzzfeed.
A photo of Sant with Defending Rights & Dissent policy director Chip Gibbons, Manning and activists from Defend J20 Resistance and Free Press on April 10, 2018.

212-29

President Trump’s Executive Order NSPM-7 raises supposed threats from the American-left by grouping the shooting of Charlie Kirk, for example, with property damage and misdemeanor assault charges. Rights and Dissent condemned NSPM-7 and the ongoing surveillance operation targeting Trump’s political opponents.

Chip Gibbons, Policy Director with Defending Rights & Dissent, told Unicorn Riot that he was alarmed that a photo featuring him, a former U.S. Army intelligence analyst known for leaking the Collateral Murder video to Wikileaks and a Minnesota 15 defendant, appeared in a DHS file.

“Although the petition drop with Chelsea Manning was obviously a publicly promoted event, it is troubling to see it appear in a DHS file. We know that law enforcement and intelligence agencies like DHS treat speech as suspicious and love to deploy guilt by association,” said Gibbons. “This photo has nothing to do with any criminal case or criminal investigation. It is pure speech.”

Gibbons said the photo inside a DHS case file highlighted the kind of shoddy tactics the Justice Department uses to surveil and potentially criminalize political speech.

Screenshot of the Clearview AI face search results of MN15 defendant Isaac Sant showing an image of Sant in D.C. with others including Chelsea Manning in 2018. Image from page 2 of 8, document 212-29 of the exhibits from a motion of discovery by Sant’s legal team.

“I already had concerns with the charges being an attempt by the Trump admin to criminalize dissent, and if this is the type of evidence they’re gathering, those concerns are certainly heightened,” said Gibbons. “We at Defending Rights and Dissent have long expressed concern about the impact of facial recognition on First Amendment rights and I think this incident really illustrates how well founded those concerns were.”

Sant said his opposition to facial recognition stems from his experiences observing ICE’s rampage throughout Minnesota.

“I am opposed to the use of facial recognition software by the government categorically. During Metro Surge here in January, there was a time when ICE agents were pulling up on people at the bus stop, scanning their faces, and black-bagging them on the spot.”
Isaac Sant

“I think this is unconscionable,” Sant said, “and we need to roll back this surveillance state they’re building.”

Watch our interview with Sant, filmed a week after he was arrested and charged. [Vimeo link | YouTube link]