He lives in Rochester, New York, and is married to an Episcopal priest. He has two kids, no major criminal record, and, as of January, a three-paragraph email that put him on the radar of ICE in a way that neither he nor most legal experts thought would happen.
The email was sent to Todd Lyons, who was acting as ICE Director at the time. It was written by Streever after shootings in Minnesota that got people all over the country angry and paying attention. He called Lyons a “monstrous human being” and used real-life examples to compare him to Reinhard Heydrich, a Nazi official. It was rude, angry, and made political points. There was also a lot of protected speech in it, according to constitutional lawyers.
At first, nothing took place. Then, after about five months, ICE agents David Brodie and Abbi Henry showed up at Streever’s home in Rochester while he was in Finland with his young daughter. He had his wife answer the door. The agents told her that Streever “may or may not have sent an email threatening” the ICE director and left behind what they called a “WARNING NOTICE.” This was a piece of paper telling Streever he might be breaking federal law, telling him to stop his “behavior,” and asking him to sign it and send it back to ICE.
Take a moment to think about that. A signed notice from the government asking a citizen to agree that sending a nasty email could be illegal and to stop. You might read about that in a different country with a different kind of government.
The meeting didn’t end when Streever and his daughter got back to the United States. It is said that a third agent found them in a hotel in New York City. Streever was asleep when a clerk woke him up to tell him that a federal agent was looking for him. A business card was left by the agent. Voicemails from Homeland Security callers who didn’t give their names were waiting on his phone.
For Streever’s sake, the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE) filed a federal lawsuit in the District of Columbia on July 6 against DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin. The lawsuit says that ICE and the Department of Homeland Security violated the First Amendment by retaliating against protected political speech in a way that was not legal.
DHS fought back. A spokesperson for ICE told reporters that the agency is looking into “all credible threats” against its officers and director. They also denied that the agency was trying to silence people’s speech. As background, the agency said that there had been a sharp rise in attacks and death threats against its officers. That’s a real worry that shouldn’t be brushed off quickly. But Adam Steinbaugh, FIRE’s lead lawyer, made it pretty clear: there is a difference between a credible threat and a critical email, and it doesn’t matter what you call it: federal agents showing up at someone’s house to hand their spouse a warning notice over speech is still a First Amendment problem.
It turns out that Streever isn’t the only one. The lawsuit says that a woman in Syracuse got a nearly identical warning notice on the same day that agents went to Rochester. She got it while she was volunteering at a polling place in New York for the primary elections. Steinbaugh said this is part of a bigger problem by mentioning administrative subpoenas sent to people for online speech with little oversight from the courts.
It’s still not clear how this will end or how the courts will decide. The case is getting attention for more than just one man’s email, though. Steinbaugh said that no political party has the power to silence speech. Anyone in the office can pick it up and use it. If it becomes clear that a WARNING NOTICE is a valid federal response to harsh political criticism, it won’t be easy to close that door.
