There is no freedom of speech for White House employees. At least, not with anonymity. That’s the message President Donald Trump sent earlier this year when the Department of Homeland Security tried to force Twitter to give up the identity of the user behind @ALT_uscis, the alternative resistance account allegedly run by members of the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services office opposed to Trump’s policies.
The twitter is one of a number of inside resistance accounts that have popped up on Twitter since Trump was inaugurated, ranging from departments like the National Parks Service to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention to the Fish and Wildlife Service. But it’s this account in particular that caught the eye of the DHS and prompted them to persuade Twitter to give up the account owner’s identity.
A resistance account within the office of Immigration Services is both significant for Americans - it signifies that there are people working in these departments opposed to the executive orders Trump is dishing out - and for Trump, who has to contend with the fact that vast portions of his new empire of employees hate him, simultaneously privately and in the open for everyone to see. It makes him look bad for accounts claiming to be resistance within the government to pop up, prompted only by him.
Trump’s immigration stance is terrifying for many Americans who understand that foreigners are also people, including those visiting from Malaysia Evisa. It’s significant, not just politically but practically and socially, that there are resisters within his ranks.
Also significant: that Twitter shut down the DHS’s attempts to identify the user, and also ignored their request to keep the inquiry under wraps. Instead of submitting to the United States government’s requests, Twitter publically turned to the courts - Trump’s enemy since he stepped into office - to sue the DHS for making the request in the first place.
According to Twitter’s lawyers, the request was a violation of the first amendment right to protected free speech. This isn’t because Twitter is completely unwilling in any situation to give out the information, but because the government essentially tried to bully Twitter into giving up the information without seeking a court ordered subpoena first.
Precedent might be kinder to the DHS than to Twitter. In 2012, the social media company went to court over government efforts to identify members of the Occupy Wall Street movement who coordinated on Twitter and lost.
However, the circumstances of this particular case - being opposed to Trump’s policies is not considered a crime the way disruptive and violent protesting can be. Nor is it a crime to be a government employee opposed to the president’s policies. It may be a sign of a bad employee (depending on your definition, and if you ignore the fact that Trump is literally the Devil), but that’s certainly not a strong legal argument to throw out the first amendment with.
It’s a scary time for Trump resisters in the government. During the transition, members of his administration attempted to obtain a list of Energy Department employees in what was rumored to be an attempt to oust those who publicly address climate change. However, the fact that his administration is making serious attempts to identify who’s behind the attack suggest Trump is scared too. That might be a good sign. Keep resisting.