LAS VEGAS (KTNV) — A lawsuit has been filed against the Nevada Department of Motor Vehicles for its communications with immigration officials.
The ACLU of Nevada filed the lawsuit saying the DMV refused to release documents detailing communication with Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
The lawsuit says that multiple public records requests were made by the ACLU over six months seeking the DMV's policies and internal communications related to immigration enforcement.
The ACLU further claims that it wasn't until after they sent a formal demand letter through the Attorney General's Office did they received a small set of incomplete, heavily-redacted records.
“The Nevada DMV maintains one of the largest repositories of information statewide," said Athar Haseebullah, executive director of the ACLU of Nevada. "After stonewalling our attempts for transparency in communication between the DMV and ICE, the records we’ve obtained, even while heavily redacted, suggest significant and problematic communication between the DMV and ICE."
The lawsuit says the records confirmed communications between ICE and the DMV, and that they also suggest the use of Signal.
"References to a Signal group between employees of the Nevada DMV and ICE raises enormous alarms. Signal is an encrypted communications app that makes communication between parties nearly untraceable," Haseebullah said.
Signal also has auto-delete features and no recovery mechanism that is widely used to engage in conversations that are largely untraceable.
WATCH: Channel 13 previously dug into Signal when we learned about Metro officers using it for business use through our coverage of suspended Metro Sergeant Kevin Menon.
According to the ACLU, the use of encrypted, auto-deleting messaging apps for government business likely violates record retention requirements as Nevada law requires public agencies to preserve official records and make them available upon request.
“Public records are critical," said Sadmira Ramic, senior staff attorney of the ACLU. "When an agency refuses to release them, it denies Nevadans their right to know how their government operates."
Now, the ACLU is seeking a court order to require the DMV to release all requested records in full and to comply with Nevada's public records law.
"Governor Lombardo must make all records between the Nevada DMV and ICE transparent to the public without redactions to best protect the privacy interests of Nevadans," Haseebullah said. "Without transparency, there is no accountability, and without accountability, our communities remain at risk.”
This comes after the ACLU filed a similar lawsuit against the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department.
You can watch our interview with Sheriff Kevin McMahill regarding that lawsuit here:
The organization is also seeking the complete disclosure of the existence of any Signal group chats between any staff at the Nevada DMV and any staff at ICE, including any and all communications that have occurred between ICE and the DMV on Signal.
If the DMV denies the existence that such a chat ever occurred, the organization is seeking a clear explanation for references to Signal group chats contained within the redacted emails provided to ACLU of Nevada.
"This lawsuit isn’t about discouraging people from going to the DMV," Ramic said. "This is about ensuring those services are carried out in a transparent and accountable way.”
The organization is also seeking a State investigation into all communications between ICE and the DMV by an independent audit commission or outside investigator.
Channel 13 reached out to the DMV for a response to the lawsuit and received the following response:
"We understand the public interest in this matter. However, because it is currently the subject of active litigation, we are not in a position to comment at this time. We will provide updates if and when it becomes appropriate to do so. Thank you for your understanding."