London
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The backlash towards ICE has grown past US borders.
Capgemini, a serious French consulting and knowledge expertise firm, stated Sunday it’s going to promote a US division that does business with Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
Like different companies with hyperlinks to ICE, Capgemini has come beneath scrutiny as criticism mounts over the company’s heavy-handed enforcement ways. Jim Pattison Developments, an actual property firm, and Hootsuite, a social media firm, are two Canadian companies which have confronted public strain for his or her hyperlinks to ICE.
Anti-ICE marches have been held in a number of main US cities over the weekend in response to the Trump administration’s crackdown on undocumented immigrants, which has resulted within the fatal shootings of two US residents by ICE brokers in Minneapolis.
Capgemini’s resolution follows revelations that the Department of Homeland Security had awarded the US division in query a $4.8 million contract in mid-December to supply ICE with “skip tracing services.” Skip tracing is the method of finding individuals who are troublesome to seek out, utilizing on-line data and different sources, comparable to voter registration information.
“The nature and scope of this work has raised questions compared to what we typically do as a business and technology firm,” Capgemini CEO Aiman Ezzat wrote in a LinkedIn post final week.
The resolution to promote the US division comes after a Paris-based company watchdog, Multinationals Observatory, printed particulars of the contract, prompting questions from France’s finance and financial system minister Roland Lescure.
An archived Capgemini web page posted on the watchdog’s web site states that Capgemini was working with ICE to “help it minimize the time required and cost incurred to remove all removable illegal aliens from the US.”
In a statement asserting the sale, Capgemini stated authorized restrictions related with authorities work meant it was unable to “exercise appropriate control” over the US subsidiary’s operations to make sure it aligned with its aims.
Capgemini stated the unit represented 0.4% of the group’s world income in 2025 and fewer than 2% of its US income.
Meanwhile, Emily Lowan, the chief of the Green Party in British Columbia, has taken intention at Canadian billionaire Jim Pattison. Last week, she referred to as on Canadians to boycott the companies owned by the Jim Pattison Group, which embrace grocery chains, packaging corporations and automobile dealerships amongst others, until he “cut his ties” with ICE.
On Friday, Jim Pattison Developments, which is a part of the Jim Pattison Group, said it might now not proceed with plans to promote a warehouse in Ashland, Virginia, to the US Department of Homeland Security. It supplied no additional particulars. The firm has not responded to NCS’s request for remark.
The industrial facility was for use to “support ICE operations,” in keeping with a letter final month from the Department of Homeland Security to officers in Virginia.
Hootsuite has confronted demonstrations over the work it does with ICE’s public affairs workplace. Protestors gathered outdoors the corporate’s Vancouver headquarters on Friday, calling on it to cease doing business with ICE.
“Our use-case with ICE does not include tracking or surveillance of individuals using our tools,” Hootsuite CEO Irina Novoselsky stated in a statement final week. “We understand this is a complex issue and that people will hold strong opinions.”
“What we are watching unfold right now is wrong,” she stated. “The loss of life and the fear being felt in communities as a result of recent enforcement actions are devastating,”
American firms are additionally taking motion to distance themselves from ICE. The homeowners of a property in Oklahoma City are “no longer engaged with the Department of Homeland Security about a potential acquisition or lease,” in keeping with town’s mayor David Holt.
“I commend the owners for their decision and thank them on behalf of the people of Oklahoma City,” Holt wrote on X final week.
Minnesota-based retailers Target and Best Buy referred to as for a “de-escalation of tensions” final month.