Dems Demand Answers About Palantir's "Surveillance Nightmare"
Ten lawmakers demand answers about the federal mega-database violating privacy laws first exposed on Narativ.
Ten Democratic lawmakers led by Ron Wyden and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez just delivered a devastating 5-page letter to Palantir CEO Alex Karp that reads like a federal indictment waiting to happen.
The letter doesn't mince words: Palantir is "enabling and profiting from serious violations of Federal law by the Trump Administration" through its creation of a government-wide "mega-database" containing sensitive taxpayer data. This isn't political theater - this is Congress laying out a criminal case.
Palantir employees have been embedded directly inside the IRS, helping create a "single, searchable database" of taxpayer records that will be shared throughout the government regardless of whether access relates to tax administration. That's not just concerning - it's explicitly illegal under federal tax privacy laws that have protected Americans for nearly 50 years.
Those laws exist for a reason. They were strengthened after Nixon abused the IRS to target political enemies, with Congress creating ironclad protections under tax code sections 6103 and 7213A. Violating these provisions can result in criminal penalties including prison time. Just last year, an IRS contractor got five years in federal prison for leaking taxpayer information.
The Congressional letter makes crystal clear this goes far beyond the IRS. Palantir is simultaneously helping ICE with deportation operations, embedding software across multiple federal agencies, and bragging about enabling military customers to "bring violence and death to our enemies." The company has secured billions in government contracts while building what lawmakers describe as a "surveillance nightmare."
The letter poses seven pointed questions that Palantir must answer by July 10, including whether the company received assurances it won't be held responsible for federal law violations, how many employees have quit since Trump took office, and whether Palantir has any "red lines" for human rights violations.
Perhaps most tellingly, the lawmakers compare Palantir to IBM selling computers to apartheid South Africa and punch card machines to Nazi concentration camps, Cisco building China's "Great Firewall," and other tech companies that enabled authoritarian surveillance.
This letter represents a watershed moment. Congress is no longer asking politely about Palantir's expanding surveillance role - they're documenting potential federal crimes and demanding accountability.
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