Democratic lawmakers just exposed a massive data-sharing operation that's been flying under the radar for two decades. States are giving ICE and federal agencies direct, self-service access to residents' driver's license data through a little-known network called Nlets - with 290 million queries processed last year alone. The revelation has prompted urgent calls for governors to block what lawmakers are calling "frictionless" surveillance of American drivers.
A bombshell letter from Democratic lawmakers is forcing state capitals to confront an uncomfortable truth: they've been quietly handing over their residents' most sensitive data to federal immigration authorities for years, often without realizing the full scope of what's happening.
The congressional warning, sent to governors in Arizona, California, Colorado, and Wisconsin, reveals how states are providing U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and other federal agencies with what the lawmakers call "frictionless, self-service access to the personal data of all of your residents." The vehicle for this massive data transfer? A nonprofit called the National Law Enforcement Telecommunications System, or Nlets, managed by state police agencies.
The numbers are staggering. According to the congressional letter, Nlets facilitated "over 290 million queries for DMV data" in the year leading up to October 2025. ICE alone made more than 290,000 of those requests, while Homeland Security Investigations contributed another 600,000 queries.
What makes this particularly concerning is the direct access model. For two decades, most states have allowed approximately 18,000 federal and local law enforcement agencies across the U.S. and Canada to search and retrieve residents' drivers' licenses and other DMV database information without any state employee involvement or oversight. It's a automated pipeline that most state officials don't fully understand, according to the lawmakers.
"Because of the technical complexity of Nlets' system, few state government officials understand how their state is sharing their residents' data with federal and out-of-state agencies," the letter warns. This information gap explains why so few states have locked down their data sharing practices.
The surveillance implications extend beyond basic identification checks. The letter suggests ICE might be feeding drivers' license photos into its facial recognition app called Mobile Fortify, which relies on a database of 200 million photos and allows agents to identify people on the street in real-time.
The timing isn't coincidental. With immigration enforcement expected to ramp up significantly, lawmakers are urging governors to block access to "other federal agencies that are now acting as Trump's shock troops." The letter emphasizes that cutting off this unfettered access wouldn't prevent federal agencies from obtaining information for legitimate criminal investigations - it would simply require them to go through proper channels with state oversight.
