President-elect Donald Trump's transition advisor Peter Thiel stands to profit from the incoming administration's plan for large-scale deportations, The Intercept reported.
The Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency Office of Homeland Security Investigations paid Thiel's company Palantir millions for their intelligence system, FALCON, which allows the ICA to access massive amounts of data on immigrants. Palantir has a second multi-million-dollar deal to build a case management system for HSI, to help process the tens of thousands of legal cases that arise annually.
Last week, Thiel declined to confirm if he has signed paperwork banning his involvement in any transition plans that would conflict with his private interests, according to Politico.
"Given the broad scope of Palantir's business with the federal government and Mr. Thiel's investments, it seems to me that he should step away from a pretty broad set of transition issues," Norman Eisen, former U.S. Ambassador to the Czech Republic and former chief ethics lawyer for President Barack Obama's administration, told the Intercept.
"Whenever anything touching on that agency is at issue, he should step out of the room and he should not be copied on emails about it," Eisen added. "The information he learns about that agency could be immediately useful to him in his Palantir duties."
Palantir did not respond to inquests from The Intercept about its government contracts or potential conflicts of interest, as did Thiel's spokesman Jeremiah Hall.
A spokesperson for ICE did confirm Palantir's work with the agency, telling The Intercept in an email: "The current contract options with Palantir will run through November 2018."
The spokesperson declined to "speculate on future renewals," when asked if the contract with Palantir will continue under Trump.
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