DHS Issues ‘Be on the Lookout’ Alert for Comedian Ben Palmer

The Department of Homeland Security circulated a “Be on the Lookout” alert to law enforcement nationwide, targeting comedian Ben Palmer for his satire of U.S. immigration enforcement.

Palmer, a Nashville-based standup comedian and prankster, created a parody anti-immigration tip website. His videos of calls with members of the public who thought they were reporting immigrants to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement have garnered millions of views on TikTok and YouTube.

The DHS bulletin was issued by the department’s Nashville field office in February, about a week before the Washington Post profiled Palmer after a kindergarten teacher reported a student’s parent to Palmer’s supposed tip page on spurious grounds, believing she was communicating with the government.

The alert, known as a BOLO, was then shared by the Illinois State Police to a distribution list of state and local law enforcement agencies. It was obtained by the Chicago-based nonprofit Injustice Watch through a public records request regarding an unrelated matter. How many other law enforcement departments shared the federal alert was not immediately clear.

The alert was headlined “online immigration impersonation” and noted that Palmer, a U.S. citizen, “operates a satirical website impersonating a submission form, which acts as a mechanism for reporting suspected illegal aliens.” It included a screenshot from Palmer’s spoof tip website, two screenshots from his YouTube channel with 807,000 subscribers, and his photograph.

While Palmer’s site uses language such as “official report form” and says reports are “submitted through official federal channels,” the comedian does not claim to work for ICE. The privacy policy contains a disclaimer that the site is “for parody.”

Near the bottom of the BOLO alert, DHS acknowledged the comedian did not pose a danger. “At this time, there appears to be no direct threat to life or infrastructure,” the alert reads.

A DHS spokesperson said in an email: “There is no ‘investigation’ into this individual – this document is an internal memo shared for awareness purposes only,” adding that “law enforcement and civilians should be aware of potential websites and individuals impersonating federal law enforcement.”

Palmer said he did not know about the BOLO until an Injustice Watch reporter informed him. He called it a badge of honor to be singled out by the government for his comedy, though he expressed concern that such monitoring could escalate into something more serious, such as arrest.

“To be honest, for me, it’s the best of both worlds. I don’t get arrested but I still get to say that the Department of Homeland Security created a document about me, which is … in my line of work I always look at these things as more like certificates, badges of honor,” he said.

He added: “The government wastes a lot of time in tax dollars, for sure, but when you have your own little section on that, it’s kind of like, I feel honored.”

Darius Reeves, a retired ICE field office director, said BOLOs more commonly include terms such as “‘considered armed and dangerous,’ ‘approach with caution,’ or ‘do not approach at all'” reflecting the seriousness of the threat they describe. They are typically issued nationwide and reserved for serious threats to public safety.

Reeves said he understood why federal immigration authorities would be wary of a fake tip line but thought a BOLO issued for a comedian was “unusual.”

Illinois’s Statewide Terrorism and Intelligence Center shared the alert about Palmer to its email list “for situational awareness purposes.”

Brendan Kelly, the Illinois state police director, did not respond to questions about why his agency shared the BOLO. Spokesperson Melaney Arnold said in an email that the center “routinely and quickly disseminates information produced by other federal, state, and local law enforcement agencies” and does so “with the understanding that the originating agencies have done their investigative due diligence to disseminate credible and important information.”

Palmer is not the first comedian targeted by DHS under the Trump administration for satirizing immigration enforcement. Earlier this year, federal officers took down and detained Rob Potylo while he wore a giraffe costume and demonstrated against ICE in Minneapolis. Potylo, a musician and comedian, was also detained by federal officers in Portland, Oregon, last year. In 2018, DHS agents showed up at the Brooklyn home of comedian Jake Flores after he posted satirical tweets about ICE.

Esha Bhandari, who directs the American Civil Liberties Union’s Speech, Privacy, and Technology Project, said the BOLO could be understood as part of a pattern of DHS targeting private citizens critical of the agency.

The federal agency has to know, Bhandari said, “that by taking any official law enforcement action against someone, that they’re intending to scare people away from speaking out against them.”

Palmer said he hopes to garner support from First Amendment attorneys now that his name has been distributed to law enforcement agencies nationwide, but it will not dissuade him from his work.

“I don’t want to get arrested,” Palmer said, adding: “But it would be nice to have a footnote in the history of comedy.”

This story was produced by Injustice Watch, a nonprofit newsroom in Chicago that investigates issues of equity and justice in the Cook County court system.