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Dear John,
Late last month, secretive technology company Palantir went public. But Palantir isn’t just any tech company — it’s best known for the software it sells to the U.S. government, including Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).
For years, Palantir executives have dodged left and right, failing to answer questions about whether the company’s products and services are implicated in ICE’s abuses against migrants and asylum-seekers. But now that the company is publicly traded, we have a new chance to get answers.
Tell Palantir CEO Alex Karp: you can’t keep avoiding public scrutiny. We demand transparency — and your commitment to upholding human rights.
Amnesty has conducted in-depth research on Palantir, and its record with ICE is revolting: In 2017, ICE relied on Palantir technology to arrest parents and caregivers of unaccompanied children, which led to detentions. ICE also used Palantir technology for mass workplace raids that led to the separation of children from their parents and caregivers. These raids led to cases of prolonged detention and deportations.
As a publicly-traded company, Palantir is now subject to scrutiny that it has sought to avoid for years. That means we can publicly pressure the company to change — but we need to show how many people care about its role in ICE operations.
When called out by Amnesty, Palantir has deflected and minimized its responsibility to protect human rights. But we know that there is a high risk that Palantir is contributing to human rights violations of asylum-seekers and migrants through the ways the company's technology facilitates ICE’s operations. Through its contracts with ICE for certain products and services, Palantir is facilitating ICE’s execution of harmful policies targeting migrants and asylum-seekers.
They’ve even proven it themselves: In a recent open letter in response to Amnesty’s pressure, Palantir accidentally admitted that its technology is used in operations to identify immigrants that can lead to detention and deportation.
Now that it’s publicly traded, the company cares a lot more about its image, and that’s why I’m asking you to speak out, John:
Add your name to tell Palantir to clean up its act, and prevent its software from contributing to human rights violations.
The U.S. government and ICE must take responsibility for creating and maintaining a harmful environment for the treatment of migrants and asylum‐seekers. However, Palantir also has its own responsibility to respect human rights — and we can demand it carry those out.
Thank you for speaking up in defense of human rights.
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