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Today, we filed a FOIA request with DHS concerning an AI-generated image the @DHSgov X account posted this morning. The image depicts a Transformer facing a South Asian man, over a caption telling "Mr. Singh" to self-deport and get off American roads. We want the prompt.

The prompt that generated this AI image is a record of what someone actually typed to produce it. It would show whether a federal employee specified this man's race, his ethnicity, his religion, or what he was wearing, and in what words.

The Department controls how it characterizes what it publishes. It does not control what the underlying record shows. The prompt is that record.

DHS has been publishing AI-generated content on its official accounts for over a year. Nobody outside the department knows who approves it, whether anyone reviews it for civil rights implications, or whether any rules govern it at all.

You can follow this request and others at our PSB FOIA GitHub page.

This is a great idea. I’d love to n ow what the prompts are for all their racist AI crap.

I'll be gobsmacked if they kept any record whatsoever. Not to evade accountability, explicitly, but because it never crossed their mind there would be any accountability. @brianbeutler.bsky.social 2016 piece on Trump and impunity never stops crossing my mind.

Of course the FOIA request is still valuable. First, it might retrieve something. Second, it might force them to proactively conceal or delete something, which gets them in hotter water. And third, establishes that "The dog ate my prompts" doesn't cut it. Make them think about criming, at least.