U.S. Customs and Border Protection’s policy and practice of prohibiting the use of cameras and video recorders at or near U.S. ports of entry is unconstitutional, said the ACLU (American Civil Liberties Union) and the law firm Morrison & Foerster LLP in a lawsuit filed last week. Clients in the case, two U.S. citizens, said they were attempting to document “environmental and human rights abuses” when border agents stopped, detained, and interrogated them and then deleted their photographs.
The suit charges that Ray Askins, a U.S. citizen who lives in Mexicali, and Christian Ramirez, a U.S. citizen who lives in San Diego, were stopped in separate incidents on the U.S. side of the border.
Askins was conducting research for a report about pollution for an environmental conference when he was stopped. Askins claims that several border agents told him they would “smash the camera” if he did not delete photos he took of a secondary inspection area at the Calexico Port of Entry. His camera was confiscated and, when it was returned to him, all but one photograph he had just taken at the port of entry had been deleted.
Ramirez, who works for Alliance San Diego, an nonprofit “social justice” open borders group, claims that he had just crossed the border when he observed male CBP agents patting down women. He snapped several photos, because he said it appeared the agents were only searching women. CBP agents took the Ramirezes’ passports and his phone, and deleted all the photos Ramirez had just taken.
According to the ACLU, the lawsuit seeks to stop the government from preventing or interfering with the public’s First Amendment speech rights and asks that Askins receive damages for the violation.