Protest follows two ICE murders in span of few days

Nurses and constituents held a press conference and protest on Wednesday, July 15 at the Chicago residence of Senator Dick Durbin to demand he donate his financial contributions from Palantir Technologies, the tech company powering ICE surveillance, to immigrant rights groups. According to Purge Palantir’s “Palantir Payroll” tracker, Senator Durbin has received more than $14,000 in political donations from Palantir executives. 

Palantir’s surveillance systems fuel deportation, detention, and human rights abuses – including the murders of Johan Sebastián Durán Guerrero in Maine and Lorenzo Salgado Araujo in Texas. Both fathers were shot and killed by federal immigration agents in the last week. At the press conference, community members urged Sen. Durbin to join U.S. representatives Raja Krishnamoorthi, Ro Khanna, Jason Crow, Pat Ryan and U.S. Senator John Hickenlooper in publicly rejecting Palantir’s campaign contributions. 

“We are calling on all elected officials including Senator Durbin to take the pledge to reject Palantir money and acknowledge that Palantir poses a fundamental threat to individual privacy, our democracy, and our Constitution,” Brenda Langford, RN at Cook County Health, said at the protest.

“Palantir’s technology enables crimes against humanity and nurses are here to say no,” said Cathy Kennedy, RN and president of National Nurses United. “Nurses are here to protect our patients, to protect immigrant workers, and to protect our democracy from tech billionaires. That is why we are demanding our elected officials, like Senator Dick Durbin, stand with us and not the billionaires. So Senator Durbin, we nurses want to know: Whose side are you on?”

Nurses were also joined at the protest by concerned Chicago residents, union members,and community activists. Maria Heavener, a teacher at Funston Elementary School and a member of Chicago Teachers Union, spoke about the impact of militarized immigration enforcement on the city’s students: “Sen. Durbin, you can’t claim to stand with our communities while taking Palantir’s money. Their tech enables ICE terror: tear gas at Midway Blitz, daily abductions, surveillance weaponized against community defenders, and the murder of our neighbors. When we suffer, Palantir profits—and those billions buy politicians and push the privatization of our schools, dealing yet another blow to the communities they’ve already devastated. Reject Palantir’s money, invest in healthcare and education instead.” 

Palantir’s growing notoriety – fueled by a growing wave of grassroots protests organized by nurses, immigrant rights activists, and community members across the country – have threatened its business and made its brand politically toxic in the United States and abroad. However, Palantir continues to benefit from its close relationship with the Trump administration.

The federal government has cut more than a trillion dollars in funding for Medicaid and Affordable Care Act subsidies – threatening health coverage for tens of thousands of Mainers and risking hospital closures and service cuts across the state – while awarding billions of dollars in contracts to Palantir. Founded by Peter Thiel and led by Alex Karp, both billionaires, Palantir’s data mining and surveillance tools centralize and organize massive amounts of data collected by the federal government, including Medicaid data, to enable ICE to target, stalk, detain, and deport immigrants. 

From 2009 to 2025, Palantir received $2.5 billion in federal government funding, but this number has grown tremendously in just the past year. Last July, the Department of Defense announced a $10 billion agreement with Palantir to use its technology to share data across federal agencies, enabling unprecedented surveillance power. This followed a $30 million contract awarded to Palantir by the Department of Homeland Security to build an AI-powered system that would identify immigrants for deportation. In Feb. 2026, the Department of Homeland Security and Palantir signed a $1 billion contract. 

National Nurses United is the largest and fastest-growing union and professional association of registered nurses in the United States with more than 225,000 members nationwide. NNU affiliates include California Nurses Association/National Nurses Organizing Committee, DC Nurses Association, Michigan Nurses Association, Minnesota Nurses Association, and New York State Nurses Association.