Private companies hope to make a fortune off the Trump administration’s mass deportation plans. Last Thursday, a day after the Trump administration announced plans for a massive new immigrant detention center in New Jersey, executives from private prison company GEO Group — which has ties to Attorney General Pam Bondi — were apparently giddy over the prospects of Trump’s plans. According to the Ohio Capital Journal:
On a Thursday earnings call, executives for one of the largest private prisons, GEO Group Inc., told investors they expect “unprecedented opportunities” under the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown by providing detention bed capacity and increasing electronic monitoring services of immigrants. The Newark detention center, Delaney Hall, will be the largest ICE processing facility and detention center on the East Coast, said George Zoley, the founder and executive chairman of GEO. GEO has pushed for a contract with ICE to reopen that facility as a detention center and even sued New Jersey over its state law that bars private and public companies from contracting with ICE to detain immigrants.
In addition to GEO Group, several other private companies are vying for government contracts to aid President Donald Trump’s anti-immigrant crackdown, Politico reported last week. The outlet reported that “a group of prominent military contractors, including former Blackwater CEO Erik Prince, has pitched the Trump White House on a proposal to carry out mass deportations through a network of ‘processing camps’ on military bases, a private fleet of 100 planes, and a ‘small army’ of private citizens empowered to make arrests,” according to a copy of the proposal obtained by Politico. The pitch carried “an estimated price tag of $25 billion,” the outlet reported.
Prince told NewsNation last week that there’s “no indication so far” that the White House will pursue his group’s proposal.
“Eventually, if they’re going to hit those kinds of numbers and scale, they’re going to need additional private sector,” he said.
And as Mother Jones reported in early February, in an article titled “The Gleeful Profiteers of Trump’s Police State,” Palantir Technologies CEO Alex Karp, whose company specializes in data analysis software, sounded chipper about Palantir’s plans to help the Trump administration carry out mass deportations.
On a call with investors earlier this week, Palantir Technologies CEO Alex Karp—fresh off a week of stock surges—was euphoric. “We’re doin’ it!” he yelled, arms spread wide. “And I’m sure you’re enjoying this as much as I am!” The “it” in question? It seemed to be a reference to enabling President Donald Trump’s administration to carry out mass deportation and police surveillance domestically, while aiding the “West” globally—actions that, “on occasion,” Karp said on the call, may involve the need to “kill.” “I’m very happy to have you along for the journey,” the CEO said. “We are crushing it. We are dedicating our company to the service of the West and the United States of America, and we’re super-proud of the role we play, especially in places we can’t talk about.” “Palantir is here to disrupt,” he continued. “And, when it’s necessary, to scare our enemies and, on occasion, kill them.” (Palantir did not respond to a request for comment.)
As a 2020 report from The Guardian indicates, Palantir’s software has already aided Trump officials in targeting immigrant families for deportation, according to a government document obtained through a Freedom of Information Act request.
There’s a lot of money to be made in Trump’s cruel immigration crackdown — and it seems these private companies are hoping to wet their beaks.
Ja’han Jones is an MS NOW opinion blogger. He previously wrote The ReidOut Blog.