Palantir employees began to wonder if they were the bad guys

It was only a few months into President Donald Trump’s second term Palantir Employees to question their companies Commitments to civil liberties. Last fall, Palantir appeared to be just that Technological backbone From Trump’s immigration enforcement mechanism, providing software to identify, track and assist in deporting immigrants on behalf of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), when current and former employees began sounding the alarm.

Around that time, two former employees reconnected by phone. Once the call was answered, someone asked, “Are you tracking Palantir’s descent into fascism?”

“That was their greeting,” says the other former employee. “There is this feeling not that this is difficult and unpopular, but that this feeling is wrong.”

Palantir was founded — with an initial venture capital investment from the CIA — in a moment of national consensus following the attacks of September 11, 2001, when combatting terrorism abroad was seen by many as the most important mission facing the United States. The company, co-founded by tech billionaire Peter Thiel, sells software that acts as a high-powered gadget Data collection and analysis tool Operating everything from private companies to US military targeting systems.

For the past 20 years, employees have been able to tolerate intense outside criticism and awkward conversations with family and friends about working for a company named after J. R. R. Tolkien’s all-seeing orb. But a year into Trump’s second term, and as Palantir deepens its relationship with a management that many workers fear is wreaking havoc at home, employees are finally starting to raise those concerns internally, as the US war on immigrants, the war in Iran, and even statements from the company have forced them to rethink the role they play in all of this.

“We employ the best and brightest talent to help defend America and its allies and build and deploy our programs to help governments and businesses around the world,” a Palantir spokesperson said in a statement. “Palantir is not a mass of faith, and nor should we be.” “We all pride ourselves on a culture of fierce internal dialogue and even disagreement about the complex areas we work on. This has been true since our founding and remains true today.”

“The general story of Palantir, as it was told to itself and to employees, was that after 9/11, we knew there was going to be a big push for safety, and we were concerned that safety might infringe on civil liberties,” one former employee told WIRED. “And now comes the threat from within. I think there’s a bit of an identity crisis and a bit of a challenge. We were supposed to be the ones who were preventing a lot of these abuses. Now we’re not preventing them. We seem to be enabling them.”

Palantir has always had a secretive reputation, forbidding employees from speaking to the press and requiring graduates to sign Non-disparagement agreements. But throughout the company’s history, management has always at least seemed open to engagement and internal criticism, many employees say. However, over the past year, much of this commentary has been met with philosophical soliloquy and redirection. “People were never afraid to speak out against Karp,” one current staffer tells WIRED. “It’s just a question of what she would do, if anything.”

While internal tensions within Palantir have been growing over the past year, they reached a boiling point in January after the violent killing. Alex Prettya nurse who was shot and killed by federal agents during protests against Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) in Minneapolis. Employees from across the company commented in a Slack thread dedicated to the news requesting more information about the company’s relationship with ICE from management and CEO Alex Karp.