Palantir slammed for work with ICE on same week as big immigration raids

Advocacy group Mijente shines light on company's government contracts, ties to Trump

Palantir’s technology is central to U.S. immigration officials’ work, including raids and deportations, a new report says.

The 46-page report, released Thursday by immigration advocacy group Mijente, came to that conclusion based on public records that contradict the data-mining company’s previous statements that its work with ICE is limited to criminal investigations.

Mijente cites a WNYC public radio report from last month that showed Palantir’s Falcon Mobile app is used during workplace raids. In May, the group released a report that showed how Palantir software was used to track the arrival of unaccompanied minors at the border.

The Silicon Valley company’s contracts with the U.S. government total $1.5 billion, Mijente found. More than $150 million of that is from Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

The report also details the reach and influence of Peter Thiel, the billionaire entrepreneur and co-founder of Palantir who was a member of President Donald Trump’s transition team and “helped to staff agencies that went on to award major contracts to Palantir, and seeded the federal government with appointees in departmentand cabinet-level positions including U.S. chief technology officer.”

Palantir, based in Palo Alto, has not returned requests for comment.

Mijente spokeswoman Jacinta Gonzales said Thursday that the group did not try to contact the company, which has refused its requests for meetings. In late 2018, Palantir told the New York Times that it does not work with the ICE division that handles immigration enforcement, including deportation and detention of undocumented immigrants.

But Mijente’s latest report shows otherwise. In fact, the group found that the company’s “support staff works at ICE facilities in Northern Virginia to provide real-time technical support for raids.”

The report came a day af

ter the largest immigration raids in a decade, during which ICE arrested 680 people at food-processing plants in Mississippi.

Although Mijente’s report focused on Palantir’s entry into the U.S. military-industrial complex and its vital part in immigration operations, it also mentions that other tech companies — some of which have faced protests from their workers over their contracts with ICE — play a role.

“If you are a tech worker at one of these companies, history will ask what you did,” Mijente writes. “You will have to explain to your children what role you played when the government was raiding homes and caging children and whether you did all in your power to prevent suffering on your watch.”