More than 900 Google employees just put the company's leadership on blast. In an open letter published today, workers are demanding the tech giant disclose and terminate all contracts with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and Customs and Border Protection (CBP), citing recent violence and what they call the company's complicity in government surveillance operations. It's the latest flashpoint in Silicon Valley's ongoing struggle over government contracts, and it's happening while Google Chief Scientist Jeff Dean's recent call for employees to "speak up" is still fresh in everyone's minds.
Google is facing an internal reckoning. More than 900 employees have signed an open letter condemning the company's business relationships with federal immigration enforcement agencies, marking one of the most significant employee activism moments at the search giant since the Project Maven protests back in 2018.
The timing couldn't be more pointed. The letter directly references recent ICE operations that resulted in the deaths of Keith Porter, Renee Good, and Alex Pretti, with employees stating they're "appalled by the violence" and "horrified" by Google's role in it. According to the letter posted on CNBC, workers believe "Google is powering this campaign of surveillance, violence, and repression."
But this isn't just about optics or ethical posturing. The employees lay out specific technical infrastructure they say enables government surveillance. Google Cloud is allegedly supporting CBP's surveillance operations, while the company's infrastructure powers Palantir's ImmigrationOS system that ICE uses for tracking and enforcement operations. The letter also points to Google's generative AI technology being deployed by CBP and notes that the Google Play Store has blocked apps designed to track ICE activities.
What makes this particularly awkward for Google leadership is that the employees are quoting one of their own senior executives against them. The letter cites a social media post from Google Chief Scientist Jeff Dean, who wrote in early January that "we all bear a collective responsibility to speak up and not be silent when we see things like the events of the last week." Employees are essentially calling leadership's bluff - Dean said speak up, so they're speaking up.
