But on March 31, “Reddit received another message from the Feds,” The Intercept reported. “This time, instead of requesting information about an individual user, the government ordered Reddit itself to appear before a grand jury – not in California, but in Washington.”
The article stated that the subpoena was issued by prosecutors from the U.S. Attorney’s office in DC, and “the period of records sought was approximately three times the period originally requested by ICE.” The U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia is Jeanine Pirro. CLDC Executive Director Lauren Regan told The Intercept that grand jury subpoenas are a new tactic the Trump administration is using after losing repeated attempts to subpoena information in court.
Grand jury proceedings are not public. A grand jury can issue an indictment after assessing the evidence presented by prosecutors to determine if there is probable cause that someone committed a crime. Witnesses may be called to testify. If an indictment is issued, the accused will be prosecuted.
“The only legitimate use of a grand jury is to investigate federal crimes,” Regan told The Intercept. It is unclear how Doe’s Reddit posts are evidence of a crime, he said, and the administration “is able to hide what they are doing under the cover of a federal grand jury.”
Although the now withdrawn summons is public, we do not have a copy of the summons. CLDC told Ars today it had no further comment on the case and noted that grand jury subpoenas are issued confidentially.
Reddit: “We do not willingly share information with any government”
The Intercept article states, David Green, senior counsel at the Electronic Frontier Foundation, “did not know of any precedent during the recent wave of investigations related to immigration enforcement in which a major tech company has been subpoenaed to appear before one of the secret panels.” “Free speech protections are at their weakest in the context of a grand jury, he explained: The proceedings are not adversarial; their purpose is to allow the prosecutor to file charges.”
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