CBP forensic phone searches of Palestinian-American activist violated Fourth Amendment, federal judge ruled, based on unverified congressional letter

On July 16, 2026, U.S. District Judge Michael Nachmanoff of the Eastern District of Virginia ruled, following a bench trial held in May 2026, that U.S. Customs and Border Protection violated the Fourth Amendment when its officers conducted two forensic searches of the cell phones of Osama Abu Irshaid, a U.S. citizen and executive director of American Muslims for Palestine, during his return to the country through a U.S. international airport in 2024. The court found that the "reasonable suspicion" CBP cited to justify the nonroutine forensic searches -- including an unverified May 2024 letter from Rep. James Comer of the House Committee on Oversight and Accountability alleging Irshaid's organization had financial ties to Hamas, and a more than decade-old photo of Irshaid used without his consent on a Hamas-affiliated website -- did not amount to the standard required to search a citizen's device. Nachmanoff wrote that the evidence connecting Irshaid to any national security concern was too attenuated to justify the searches, and that a congressional letter is not a "tipster in the traditional sense" for Fourth Amendment purposes given the constitutional separation of powers.

CBP Officer Scott Cowles, who requested approval for one of the forensic searches, cited the Comer letter among the factors supporting it. The lawsuit, brought by the Council on American-Islamic Relations on Irshaid's behalf, had alleged the government placed him on a secret watchlist over his pro-Palestinian advocacy dating back to around 2010. On a separate First Amendment retaliation claim, the court ruled for the government, finding no evidence CBP officers acted with "retaliatory animus" toward Irshaid's advocacy and characterizing the searches instead as "well-intentioned independent misjudgment." The court ordered both parties to submit briefing within 21 days on appropriate remedies.