ADC Files Emergency Motion After CBP Seizes Couple’s Phones and Laptops at Dulles Airport in Violation of the Fourth Amendment

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
October 21, 2026
[email protected]

Washington, D.C. | The American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee (ADC) filed a motion in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia on behalf of psychiatric nurse practitioner Muhammad Numaan Imam, and his wife, software engineer Khadijah Mansoor, demanding the immediate return of four personal electronic devices seized by U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) at Washington Dulles International Airport on October 16, 2026. The couple, who are parents to a one-year-old child, were returning from an attempted family trip to Istanbul, Turkey.

This case marks another front in ADC’s growing docket of legal challenges to warrantless searches and seizures of electronic devices at U.S. borders.

“CBP appears to be escalating its use of retaliatory and viewpoint-discriminatory searches and seizures of smartphones. We’re seeing a pattern where officers use their border-search authority not to advance any legitimate border-related purpose, but to punish individuals for refusing to provide access to their personal electronic devices and for having expressed views the government didn’t approve of. The law does not grant border officers unlimited access to our personal property,” said ADC President and Legal Director Jenin Younes. “The Fourth Amendment does not permit the border-search exception to become a means of coercing compliance through the threatened or actual confiscation of travelers’ personal property.”

CBP officers confiscated the couple’s two iPhones and two laptops after Imam refused to provide his phone’s passcode, explaining that the device contained confidential patient information. Despite professional and ethical obligations to protect that information, officers allegedly told him that the Fourth Amendment did not apply at the border, he had no right to a lawyer, and that HIPAA protections did not prevent them from accessing his phone.

CBP officers referred the family to secondary screening, where Imam was questioned about his employment, social media accounts, and group chats. When he declined to unlock his phone to protect his patients’ confidential information, a supervisor allegedly informed him that CBP would also confiscate both laptops, including the one belonging to his wife. Another supervisor warned that the couple could do things the “easy way or the hard way,” claimed that CBP could access everything on their devices, and said the process could take months.

Officers ultimately seized all four devices without identifying any individualized suspicion of criminal activity, warrant, investigation, or other justification for their continued retention. The family was released at approximately 1:00 a.m. on October 17, after about three hours of questioning. Later that day, Imam received an email informing him that his Global Entry membership had been revoked because he no longer met the program’s “trusted traveler standard.”

ADC’s motion, filed under Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure 41(g), argues that the seizure and continued retention of the devices violate the Fourth Amendment and existing Fourth Circuit precedent governing forensic searches of electronic devices at the border. Under that precedent, forensic searches involving external equipment to extract data require individualized suspicion of criminal activity connected to a legitimate border-enforcement purpose.

The motion further argues that CBP’s conduct raises serious concerns of retaliation, particularly because officers threatened to seize the couple’s laptops after Imam refused to unlock his phone, and his Global Entry privileges were revoked the following day. It also points to CBP’s own directive, which generally limits retention of electronic devices to five days absent extenuating circumstances and supervisory approval, despite officers telling the couple that the process could take months.

The motion asks the Court to order the immediate return of the couple’s four devices, require the government to return and destroy any data copied or extracted from them, and provide a full accounting of who handled the devices, what searches were attempted, and what information, if any, was obtained. ADC also seeks an immediate order prohibiting further searches or examination pending judicial review, court-supervised review of any privileged data obtained, and an expedited hearing.

This case is the latest in ADC’s broader legal challenge to warrantless searches and seizures of electronic devices at U.S. borders. In July, ADC filed an emergency motion and subsequent federal lawsuit in Blumenthal v. Mullin after CBP seized journalist Max Blumenthal’s phones at Dulles International Airport. Although the phones were returned, the court authorized discovery into what officials had done with them and raised serious Fourth Amendment concerns. In September, ADC filed a similar motion in Shehadeh v. Mullin after CBP confiscated Palestinian American attorney Jalal “Jay” Shehadeh’s phone at Newark Airport despite warnings that it contained privileged attorney-client communications. His phone was also subsequently returned. ADC also filed an amicus brief with the U.S. Supreme Court in Anibowei v. Blanche, urging a clear nationwide constitutional standard for searches of electronic devices at the border.

The government’s border-search authority cannot become a license for unrestricted access to Americans’ digital lives. ADC will continue challenging these practices and demanding meaningful judicial oversight to ensure that constitutional rights remain protected at the border.

The case is Imam v. Mullin, Case No. 1:26-cv-03499, filed in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia.