Data mining company Palantir has extended its contract to provide software to federal immigration authorities despite calls for the firm to cut ties with the Trump administration over claims its technology helps prop up the administration’s immigration policies.
Owned by President Trump’s ally Peter Thiel, Palantir’s contract with Immigration and Customs Enforcement will run through 2022. It’s unclear how much the firm is being paid for its services.
Palantir was first awarded a contract to implement the agency’s Investigative Case Management System in 2014, and the order was set to expire Sept. 25, according to government documents posted this week. The system was built on Palantir’s commercial software, and ICE said the company is the only source that can provide the services required.
Because the system relies on Palantir’s software, ICE said it would be “neither cost-efficient nor in the best interest of the agency” to switch providers.
The program employed by the immigration agency is believed to have been used to organize workplace raids as part of Trump’s crackdown on illegal immigration.
Palantir has faced protests by activists to cut its ties to the Trump administration, particularly as the president has faced backlash to his zero-tolerance policy, which led to the separation of families apprehended at the southern border, and conditions at migrant detention facilities.
Employees at Amazon, meanwhile, have called for the tech giant to end its dealings with Palantir, which uses Amazon Web Services.
While the extension of ICE’s contract with Palantir may have escaped scrutiny in the past, more and more corporations are coming under fire for their work with the Trump administration, and federal immigration agencies, in particular.
Google opted last year not to renew a contract with the Pentagon for work on artificial intelligence after 4,000 Google workers signed a petition calling for “a clear policy stating that neither Google nor its contractors will ever build warfare technology.”
