Ahead of Election Day, the Trump Administration has stooped to a new low with highly publicized federal arrests of 28 California residents and reports of the Department of Homeland Security going door-to-door questioning voters, in what can only be described as blatant voter intimidation. This is the latest escalation in a coordinated campaign by the Trump administration to sow fear and confusion among California voters to shape the outcome of federal elections.
The platform behind the Investigate Case Management System for the Department of Homeland Security Investigations is powered by Palantir, a surveillance firm co-founded by billionaire Peter Thiel, a major donor to Republican candidates.
The ballot is our most powerful check on the outsized influence of corporations in our government, which is why some corporations are happy to support any attempt to silence our voices. The administration and its corporate allies are threatening our voting rights. But California will not be intimidated
By providing the government with technology, Palantir and its leadership have been instrumental in operationalizing the worst of Trump’s authoritarian attacks on communities across the country including ICE’s kidnappings and killings, as well as Trump’s racist anti-DEI agenda. Palantir is part of the arsenal of technology being used by DHS which is now weaponizing voter data to fuel ICE’s violent racial profiling, repression of dissent, and terrorizing of communities ahead of Election Day.
Homeland Security Investigations, part of DHS, is the agency analyzing voter registration records and carrying out these door-to-door operations, and Palantir technology is a core platform that underlies HSI’s investigative infrastructure. DHS and Homeland Security Investigations documents show ICE attempted to share voter data from at least six states with Palantir and that voter data was “pending Palantir entry into ELITE,” an invasive surveillance app designed by Palantir for ICE. Palantir has said that voter roll data has never been integrated into ELITE.
Californians are fighting back. Thanks to a lawsuit filed by a coalition including the California Nurses Association, National Nurses United and Voto Latino, a federal judge has ruled that the DHS targeted use of voter data likely violates the Voting Rights Act’s protections against voter intimidation and banned further sweeps involving people known or suspected to be US citizens.
The Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights has also sued the federal government to stop this voter intimidation, noting in a recent filing that the 28 arrests contradict “DOJ’s long-standing policy not to bring election related criminal actions in the lead up to an election” and that arrests cause fear among voters and election officials. This is clearly racialized voter intimidation, and it must be stopped.
Last week thirty organizations, including the Alliance of Californians for Community Empowerment, urged Congress to investigate the attempted sharing of voter data between ICE and Palantir technologies. Citing Palantir co-founder Peter Thiel’s statement that “I no longer believe that freedom and democracy are compatible,” they raised further alarm regarding private corporations and billionaires interfering in elections and potential violations of voters’ rights.
Across California and throughout the country, the same billionaires profiteering off the kidnapping and detention of our loved ones and terrorizing our communities with ICE raids are trying to make it harder for us to vote. All so they can keep us living paycheck to paycheck, while their billionaire wealth grows at our expense.
The Trump regime is once again using the power of the federal government to attack Californians, create chaos in our elections, and trying to sabotage the midterms, because the president is weak and afraid. He knows that free fair elections and the participation of millions of ordinary Californians voters are a threat to his power.
The best antidote to tyranny is democracy: Californians will not be intimidated, and we will get out the vote. That is why we Californians are organizing to get out the vote against the Trump regime and corporate billionaires’ attempts to rig and buy out our democracy. We are standing up to these efforts to violate our right to vote, because our right to vote is our power to decide our healthcare, our jobs, our housing, and to protect our families and communities.
The Trump regime thinks it can intimidate California voters and rig this election, but we’re here to say: you can’t stop us and you can’t stop California!
Christina Livingston is executive director of the Alliance of Californians for Community Empowerment Action (ACCE Action) and chair of the California Working Families Party. She has been organizing for over two decades at the intersection of racial and economic justice.
Angelica Salas is executive director of CHIRLA, a prominent immigrant rights organization in Los Angeles and one of the largest in the country. She is a state and national leader in the advocacy for immigration reform and immigrant justice.
