Data intelligence group scores windfall from ICE crackdown
Image: Florian @florianolv via Unsplash
Data intelligence giant Palantir was among a raft of tech groups, construction companies, consultancies and charter airlines to score contracts worth a total of US$22 billion related to US President Donald Trump’s immigration crackdown in the past year, according to an analysis of contracting data by the Financial Times.
Some of the contracts were for construction or logistics. The biggest beneficiary was Fisher Sand & Gravel, which has received more than US$6 billion since July from Customs and Border Protection to build portions of a wall on the southern US border. The company also happens to be headed by Republican donor Tommy Fisher. The biggest single beneficiary from the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) was CSI Aviation, which was paid $1.2 billion to broker charter flights for the agency.
The border and immigration agencies are at the centre of a political storm after ICE agents killed protestors in Minneapolis.
Other contracts went to tech groups such as Motorola, Amazon, Dell, Microsoft and Palantir, and consultancy Deloitte, which earned $100 million, including for “internet research and data analytics support services” for ICE’s division that conducts targeting operations.
Palantir was paid $88 million by ICE since January 2025. In April it was awarded a US$30 million contract for an operating system to be used to track self-deportation, and for digital tools to make it easier for ICE to identify and arrest “illegal aliens”, according to a contract notice.
The company was founded by billionaire Trump supporter Peter Thiel. It has provided services to ICE for more than a decade, including data mining software used to build profiles of people targeted by the agency.
Palantir also has major contracts with the US Department of Defence. An investigation by Byline Times has revealed how the company helped the Pentagon develop a militarised protest prediction and surveillance machine capable of detecting emerging disturbances and tracking them in real time, making troop deployments easier. Palantir provided the AI infrastructure and was contracted to expand the capabilities across the US military.
At the same time, the company was building ICE’s surveillance capacity and running its “investigative backbone”. The Palantir platform pools data from different law enforcement agencies, including fingerprints and facial recognition, analyses it in real time and makes it available for action by ICE agents.
Another investigation, by The Nerve, shows how Palantir has become embedded in the UK’s security structures, including Britain’s nuclear weapons agency that designs and manufactures nuclear warheads. With contracts totalling $920 million, the UK government is Palantir’s second largest customer after the US government. It’s UK customers include the National Health Service and the Ministry of Defence, raising national security concerns.
https://www.ft.com/content/c74170d3-237d-459c-8642-bfd71530897d
