Comment by ratelimitsteve

But intelligence and law enforcement aren't the same thing, and the CIA is specifically prohibited from operating domestically. Valiant attempt, but talking about law enforcement (again, as opposed to intelligence) activities that take place in public is a matter of settled law. We decided that you're allowed to warn people that the police are around, even if it will help people get away with crimes, as a first amendment matter when we decided that police can't make it illegal for you to flash your lights at an oncoming driver to warn them (https://firstamendment.mtsu.edu/article/headlight-flashing/). There's no steelman for this, Apple is just trying to preemptively comply with an administration that considers civil rights inconvenient.