Radical anti-ICE network uses mass Signal chat network, license plate database to track feds, dispatch agitators in Minnesota

The groups, known as “Rapid Response Networks,” have released a “guide” to their “model” of obstructing immigration enforcement in the Twin Cities on CrimethInc—a leftist website that claims to be a "rebel alliance" think tank that spurs leftist "collective action." The network around the Twin Cities mainly uses Signal chats through a network of "dispatchers" who split the city into different chunks for surveillance of ICE through tracking identifiers such as license plates.

"Sometimes, multiple dispatchers overlap to split up the extra tasks of watching the chat, relaying reports to other channels, and checking license plates,” of ICE agents, the website states. “Dispatch also helps people evenly distribute patrols across an area, takes notes, and assists people through confrontations. All patrollers in cars and on foot and stay on the call throughout their patrol. There is a constant flow of information, allowing other cars to decide whether they are well-positioned to join in, take over tailing the car, or continue searching for additional vehicles.”

The “patrollers” are those who follow ICE vehicles, and they will sometimes switch off who is following the ICE cars. Some of the license plate information is gathered from radicals in the network who track vehicles going to and from the ICE headquarters “Whipple” building. This group is called “Whipple Watch.”

The network tracks ICE movement in real time and then notifies other people in the city through the Signal chats. The network also has "a data collection team [that] collects anonymized data submitted from Whipple Watch and many of the local rapid response chats, aggregating them into consumable formats, such as interactive maps of hotspots."

There is also a team in the network that "admins [a] searchable database of license plates sorted by 'confirmed ICE,' 'suspected ICE,' 'confirmed not ICE,' and other categories."

All of this communication is also translated into different languages, according to the leftist activism group. "Finally, Spanish language relayers copy ICE alerts from dispatch calls and local chats, translate them, then send to large Spanish-language Signal and WhatsApp networks," the website says.

The leftist website then tells others to "learn from" the anti-ICE tactics being used in Minnesota, and says that the fight against ICE is "defined by those who push the envelope. People use their cars and bodies to block agents and de-arrest targeted people. They throw snowballs and rocks; they kick back canisters of tear gas. They cover cars and agents with paint and break the windows of their cars. They don’t stop screaming in the faces of abductors when they are hit, pepper sprayed, or shot with rubber bullets."

The website then claims those who "push the envelope" are "witnessing the masked abductions, undisclosed disappearances, and record-breaking deaths of this new emboldened ICE, and they are willing to take real risks to stop them." It goes on to add that these people, who are committing felony offenses in legal terms, are "stronger, and braver in spite of it."