Washington — DHS Sent 185,000 Subpoenas Since Trump Took Office

Homeland Security Investigations has sent out an estimated 185,000 administrative subpoenas since the start of the Trump administration in January 2025, according to a recent court filing cited by WIRED. The figure, disclosed in a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit brought by the Electronic Frontier Foundation against the Department of Homeland Security, dwarfs historical usage: a prior WIRED analysis found ICE agents sent roughly 170,000 of a comparable subpoena, known as a 1509 customs summons, over more than six and a half years between the start of 2016 and mid-August 2022.

The tool, run by HSI, the investigative wing of Immigration and Customs Enforcement that typically handles transnational crime, does not require a judge's sign-off. The scale of the increase has drawn scrutiny from civil liberties lawyers who say the government is using a decades-old customs authority for purposes far removed from tariff enforcement.

What Is an Administrative Subpoena?

An administrative subpoena lets a federal agency demand records from a company or individual without going to court first. Unlike a grand jury subpoena or a judicial order, the government does not have to tell a judge why it wants the documents or what it is seeking. Congress gave this power to the US Customs Service nearly a century ago so officers could inspect business records tied to imported merchandise and verify duties owed, according to WIRED's reporting. In 2003, when Congress created the Department of Homeland Security, it folded the Customs Service and its subpoena authority into the new agency.

How Does 185,000 Compare to Prior Use?

The 185,000 figure covers roughly the first year and a half of the second Trump administration. The earlier count of about 170,000 1509 customs summonses spanned more than six and a half years, from 2016 through mid-August 2022, per WIRED's prior analysis. Aaron Mackey, deputy legal director at the Electronic Frontier Foundation, said the group wants more detail on how the 185,000 number was calculated. It remains unclear whether that total covers only subpoenas sent to technology companies, internet platforms and service providers — the specific scope of EFF's original FOIA request — or a broader set of demands across HSI's caseload.

Why Has HSI Expanded Its Use?

Since January 2025, the federal government has used DHS's administrative subpoena power for investigations that go beyond customs and immigration enforcement in the traditional sense, according to WIRED. Reported uses include attempts to unmask anonymous online critics and requests for broad customer records tied to protest activity. One example cited by WIRED: a list of people in the Minneapolis-St. Paul area who had purchased a specific green beanie from REI.

What Does the Law Allow?

DHS has not always claimed this authority covers protest-related or online-speech investigations. In 2017, the DHS inspector general admonished Customs and Border Protection's Office of Professional Responsibility for trying to use a customs summons to identify an anonymous Twitter poster, noting the agency's own procedures manual limited customs summonses to "information related to customs or immigrations laws," WIRED reported. That position has since shifted. The Trump administration has argued in court that because the Customs Service's authority transferred to DHS under the Homeland Security Act, the department can use it across its "broad investigative portfolio" — language from the administration's own court filing, as reported by WIRED.

What's Next in the EFF Lawsuit?

The 185,000 figure surfaced because EFF sued DHS under the Freedom of Information Act after the department did not fully respond to the group's records request. EFF had asked specifically how many administrative subpoenas ICE or DHS sent to technology companies, internet platforms and service providers since January 20, 2025. Mackey told WIRED the organization is pressing for clarity on what the disclosed total actually represents before drawing further conclusions about how HSI is deploying the authority. No court ruling on the scope of DHS's subpoena power has been reported in connection with this case.

The dispute sits at the intersection of a century-old customs tool and a subpoena volume that, by DHS's own estimate, now outpaces nearly seven years of prior use in a fraction of the time — a gap that FOIA litigation is still working to explain in full.