Author: mindyigreenspan

  • Palantir Divestment Letter Campaign Targets state violence at Delaney Hall

    Palantir tracks, then ICE and the Israeli/US war machine attack!

    Palantir rastrea, ¡y luego el ICE y la maquinaria de guerra israelí-estadounidense atacan!

    Muchos de los detenidos en Delaney Hall, en Newark, fueron rastreados mediante la tecnología de Palantir y cazados en las calles por ICE. Todos hemos visto la presión ejercida por más de 300 valientes migrantes encarcelados en Delaney Hall en huelga de hambre y de trabajo con el apoyo de organizadores comunitarios, quienes exigen ser tratados como seres humanos.

    La respuesta inicial de la gobernadora Sherrill a las demandas de los huelguistas fue la inacción, seguida por el despliegue de una represión violenta. Debido a la presión sostenida sobre la gobernadora, esta semana hemos visto algunas concesiones, incluyendo un aumento en la financiación para cubrir las necesidades legales de los detenidos. Sin embargo, aunque afirma reconocer los abusos contra los derechos humanos que ocurren en Delaney Hall y que, en última instancia, desea cerrarlo, el sistema de pensiones de Nueva Jersey mantiene inversiones en dos empresas que apoyan este sistema de violencia estatal: Palantir y GEO Group.

    La gobernadora Sherrill volvió a nombrar a Shoaib Khan, director de inversiones del estado, para administrar los 91 mil millones de dólares que se encuentran en el sistema público de pensiones. A pesar de la presión pública, el Director de Inversiones, Shoaib Khan, ha mantenido una inversión de aproximadamente 140 millones de dólares en acciones de Palantir. En resumen, nuestros impuestos y fondos de pensiones están apoyando a una empresa que recopila datos sobre todos nosotros, señala a inmigrantes negros y latinos, y facilita la violencia estatal contra manifestantes pacíficos.

    De hecho, se han adquirido acciones adicionales, ya que las inversiones relacionadas con la detención de nuestros vecinos en campos de concentración, el daño ambiental y el genocidio en el extranjero resultan altamente rentables.

    Además, el sistema de pensiones de Nueva Jersey también posee aproximadamente 800.000 dólares en bonos corporativos de GEO Group.

    Por favor, hagan saber a la gobernadora Mikie Sherrill y al Director de Inversiones Shoaib Khan que queremos que nuestros fondos apoyen a nuestras comunidades, no que las destruyan. ¡Desinviertan en Palantir! ¡Desinviertan en GEO Group!


    Many of the detainees at Delaney Hall in Newark were tracked by Palantir’s technology and hunted down by ICE. We’ve all seen the pressure that’s been brought to bear by the 300+ brave hunger and labor strikers along with community organizers, demanding to be treated as human beings.

    Governor Sherrill’s response to the demands of the strikers initially was inaction and then an unleashing of violent state repression. Due to the sustained pressure on the governor, we have seen some concessions with increased funding for detainees’ legal needs. However, although the Governor says that she recognizes the human rights abuses happening at Delaney and ultimately wants to close it, the NJ pension system maintains investments in two companies that maintain this system of state violence:Palantir and GEO Group.


    Governor Sherrill re-appointed Shoaib Khan, the state’s chief investment officer, to manage the $91 billion that’s held in the public pension system. The Chief Investment Officer, Shoaib Khan, despite public pressure, has maintained an investment of roughly $140 million in Palantir stock. So, in essence our tax and pension dollars are supporting a company which is collecting data on all of us, targeting black and brown immigrants and is enabling state violence against peaceful protesters. In fact additional shares have been purchased as the investment in the terror and detention of our neighbors into concentration camps, harm to the environment and genocide abroad are highly profitable. The NJ pension system also holds ~$800,000 in GEO Group corporate bonds.


    Please send this updated letter to Governor Mikie Sherrill and CIO Shoaib Khan to let them know that we want our funds supporting our communities, not tearing them apart. Divest from Palantir! Divest from GEO Group!

    Add my name.

  • Palantir/ICE at work: Report on ongoing hunger & labor strike against unjust detention and inhumane conditions at Delaney Hall

    What is happening at the Delaney Hall detention center is a microcosm of everything that is wrong with the company Palantir and why the state of New Jersey should not be investing $130 million in such a company. In addition to Palantir’s tools enabling the AI-generated Gaza genocide and war crimes in Iran and Lebanon, here at home Palantir has a $30 million federal contract with the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to develop “ImmigrationOS.” This AI-powered software platform is the digital backbone of ICE’s tracking and deportation operations.  

    Delaney Hall in Newark, NJ, is a 1,000-bed private for-profit immigrant detention prison operated by The GEO Group for ICE. Last week, a letter to public officials signed by some 300 detainees was smuggled out detailing the inhumane conditions they were subject to, including spoiled and inedible food, lack of medical care, overcrowding, undrinkable water, lack of due process, and other human rights concerns. On Friday, May 22, hundreds of detainees launched a hunger and labor strike to call attention to the inhumane conditions as well as their lack of due process.

    These are their demands:

    1. An immediate in-person meeting with Governor Mikie Sherrill at Delaney Hall to directly observe conditions and hear testimony from detained individuals. 
    2. The immediate release of vulnerable detainees including pregnant women, young people, elderly, and those with serious medical conditions
    3. Meaningful review of immigration cases and habeas filings.
    4. An end to what they describe as coercive pressure to sign deportation or voluntary departure documents.  
    5. Strikers do not want better conditions and treatment. They want FREEDOM!

    Advocates for the detainees and their families organized a vigil, which is ongoing, to support the strikers. Hundreds of supporters responded. This past weekend, Federal ICE agents in riot gear were deployed to push back against demonstrators who blocked the exit routes to prevent detainees from being relocated to unknown detention facilities away from their families. Among the weapons ICE deployed was a Lenco BearCat armored vehicle equipped with a roof-mounted weapon capable of discharging tear gas, pepper spray, or rubber bullets. ICE agents have continued to attack and pepper-spray peaceful demonstrators numerous times. New Jersey Senator Andy Kim was pepper-sprayed as he tried to de-escalate the situation.  Retaliatory violence and abuse have stepped up against the strikers inside and several detainees have been transported by ambulance due to injuries sustained at the hands of guards.

    Here are actions you can take to support the strikers:

    • If you can, please join the 24-hour vigil to support the strikers at Delaney Hall! 

  • Many activists turn out to demand divestment from Palantir at April 29th SIC meeting.

    The ongoing letter campaign to the public pension system decision makers, aka the Governor, Treasurer and Division of Investment, calling for immediate divestment of the > $130 million in Palantir stock was launched in early April: To this date 425 activists have sent those letters! If you haven’t signed please do so using this link and share it with friends, family, networks to keep up the pressure!

    4/29/2026: State Investment Council (SIC) quarterly meeting: Over 30 people spoke strongly at the SIC meeting calling for the divestment of Palantir from public pension funds.

    Here are some of the powerful words that Break the Bonds NJ activists, NJ residents, immigrants rights activists, public sector union members and pension holders had to say to the SIC.

    “Palantir software selects targets for drone strikes and runs the deportation logistics for ICE. Its tools have been tied to operations in Gaza, Lebanon, and reportedly Iran, where civilians, including schoolchildren, have been killed.”

    “Palantir’s AI software is used to push state and federal agencies to comply with their recent discriminatory executive orders, targeting DEI and LGBTQ related research and services. The bottom line is that Palantir profits from fear mongering attacks on our immigrant neighbors, DEI values that make New Jersey a welcoming and diverse state, and strengthen unfounded attacks on trans people.

    “Your investments, connect you to the real world consequences of these actions. To distance yourself from that connection is to ignore the role institutions can play in either preventing or enabling harm. I urge you to reconsider these investments. If we believe in human rights, then our actions must reflect those values, consistency matters, accountability matters. We do not live in isolation. Our choices affect others.“

    “Palantir is complicit in, and profits from, apartheid Israel’s ongoing Nakba and genocide in Palestine. The wars on Iran, and Lebanon, and the ICE terror campaign against black and brown immigrant communities in this country. What possible ethical reason could there be for including a company such as this in the state’s investment portfolio? …are apartheid, genocide, wars of aggression, and racist xenophobia, values that the state leadership embraces, is short term financial gain more important than building just and sustainable societies at home and abroad. Sociopathic elites are dragging humanity to the abyss. Cutting ties with Palantir is one step, the SIC can take, at once concrete and symbolic, to pull us back from the edge, divest from Palantir, and Israel state bonds now.“

    “I’m here to speak against the use of New Jersey public pension funds to invest in Palantir.  Money is being used to fund surveillance systems tied to ice detention, and Israel’s genocide of the Palestinian people. …this is not just a moral issue, but it’s a financial one. Across the country and globally, institutions are increasingly moving to divest from Palantir, due to the reputational risk, public pressure, and long term instability tied to controversial government contracts. When the company’s business model depends on policies that are undergoing legal, political, and public scrutiny, this is not a stable investment. It’s a volatile one.“

    “Palantir was fine tuned in Gaza, targeting doctors, first responders, humanitarian aid workers, journalists, and children. It is now being used in attacks in similar ways, in Iran and Lebanon. It is used by ice to conduct raids, family separation, detention, and deportation of innocent people. I imagine every member of the SIC is aware that Palentir is a tool of death, destruction and terror. And that all U.S. citizens, all of us, are being surveilled in unprecedented ways, with unknown consequences. So I urge the director and members of the SIC to divest from Palantir, and to invest more ethically in entities that actually benefit New Jersey pension holders, communities, and humanity in general. We are all connected. “

    “Just this past week, the U.S. Department of Agriculture handed Palantir $300 million in no bid contracts to consolidate American farm data into a single platform, the deal built around something called one farmer, one file, will give Palantir a unified digital profile of every farmer in the country. Their land, their subsidies, their supply chains, all of it, running through the same foundry platform that already powers ICE deportations and military targeting.“

    “I will refer the council to its own environmental, social, and governance and sustainable living document, which is meant, in part, to monitor the investment risks related to climate change and global warming. Here in New Jersey, residents, communities, and municipalities are standing together to prevent the construction of the data centers necessary to power the artificial intelligence used by companies like Palantir. The harms these data centers cause to the environment are widely documented. The SIC needs to take a deep look at the environmental harms caused by these data centers, AI and Palantir, and determine if the end justifies the means. The SIC should be morally and ethically bound to personally and collectively end this supportive relationship of fear, intimidation, and death.”

    “This awful company Palantir here is funding domestic terrorism in the United States, targeting American citizens, and nonviolent immigrants regardless of status, how this company is fueling a genocide in Gaza. And I think it’s important to acknowledge that that’s what this is. This is not a campaign. It’s a genocide in Gaza. that’s been going on for 3 years and has left basically 2 million people homeless for 3 years… this is not a company we can justify doing business with…I am vested in the state pension system as a former state employee, and in my job, I do work with state pensioners very often. They do not, and we do not want our pensions tied up with this instrument of war and terrorism.“

    Coverage of SIC meeting in NorthJersey.com.

    In order to maximize our potential Break the Bonds NJ has set up committees to focus on these aspects of the campaign:

    Legislative: Communications: Outreach

    We’re building power to win divestment of our public funds and end our complicity in Palantir’s harm!

    If you’re interested in getting more involved in the campaign and want to work with one of these committees or reach out with any questions, please contact us at: info@breakthebondsnj.org

  • Update on Palantir Divestment campaign 

    Break the Bonds NJ and allies held a spirited rally and press conference in New Brunswick, on Tax Day, April 15, 2026 near the Rutgers campus in New Brunswick to demand the NJ pension system divest ~ $130 million in Palantir stock. Palantir, is the AI tech company that profits from the genocide abroad and ICE state violence at home.

    Speakers included:

    • Leqaa Kordia, recently released Palestinian American who spent over 1 year in ICE detention.
    • David Letwin, Rutgers professor and AAUP member
    • Joseph Latouf, retired CWA member
    • Mindy Greenspan for Break the Bonds NJ
    • Meera Jaffrey, retired teacher, member of NJEA

    Additional speakers included a Rutgers student as well as immigrant rights activists.

    See PIX11 news coverage of the rally here:

    https://pix11.com/news/local-news/nj-immigrant-groups-call-for-state-to-divest-from-palantir/

    Take action now:

    Letter campaign – so far 1750 letters have been sent to the decision makers.  Let’s keep up the momentum: If you haven’t signed the letter please do that using this link.

    Sign up to speak at the next State Investment Council virtual meeting on Wednesday April 29th at 10AM.  Register to speak at this link.

    Stay posted for how to join a hands -on campaign meeting and speaker training on April 27th ahead of the SIC session.

  • Palantir Divestment campaign launch and actions

    Please join us for the launch of the Break the Bonds NJ campaign to divest our pension money from Palantir. Due to our efforts, the NJ State Investment Council divested $5 million of the $20 million in Israel Bonds that came due last fall. It is a minor victory but we intend to keep up the pressure to divest from all Israel Bonds as they come due. The next installment does not mature until 2028. In the meantime, our focus will be on Palantir.

    The NJ Division of Investment has used our taxpayer and pension funds to invest over $140 million in the AI surveillance and military tech private company Palantir. In 2024, Palantir entered into a “partnership” with the Israeli military to provide tools that are facilitating the ongoing genocide in Palestine. Palantir also has long-standing contracts with ICE to provide the software that powers the targeting, kidnapping, and detention of our neighbors, terrorizing our communities. Palantir is a company that has made windfall profits off of destroying lives and communities at home and abroad. 

    Here’s 3 actions you can take to support this campaign to divest NJ from Palantir:

    1. Join us to launch the campaign on Tax Day, Wednesday, April 15th at Monument State Park at 2 Livingston Avenue in New Brunswick. Please share and spread this flyer to everyone in your contacts. Hope to see you there! 
    1. Sign the letter campaign targeting the State Investment Council members, the Chief Investment Officer, the Treasurer, and the Governor. Demand that they divest our pension and tax funds from Palantir:
    1. Speak and make your outrage heard at the next State Investment Council meeting on Wednesday, April 29th: Register at this link for virtual meeting: https://www.nj.gov/treasury/assets/contact/doinvest/contact-sc.shtml

    See additional resources below:

    Thank you.

    Break the Bonds NJ Campaign

  • Take Action: Join the Campaign to Demand NJ Divest from Palantir.

    Take Action to Divest NJ state funds from Palantir

    • Sign this one click letter to the decision makers in NJ state and demand they sell > $140 million in Palantir stock! We don’t want our tax and pension funds invested in AI guided violence, death, and destruction in the US and abroad.
    • Speak out at the next NJ State Investment Council meeting (virtual only) on 4/29/2026. Hold the date – Link and talking points to follow.

    Visit the Break the Bonds NJ table at the Palestinian Cultural Fair and Concert 3/22/2026 in Jersey City to learn more and get involved!

  • Break the Bonds NJ Presentation to the ESG Committee of the State Investment Council, 2/17/2026

    Break the Bonds NJ Presentation to the ESG Committee of the State Investment Council, 2/17/2026

    At the State Investment Council’s Annual meeting on 1/28/2026, the Director announced that he had reinvested $15 million out of the $20 million bond that had matured, in a new 5 year bond. While this represents an overall divestment of $5 million it is not the outcome we were fighting for. At the meeting we made our outrage heard and two of the SIC members voiced displeasure at not being consulted. That impact secured a long promised meeting with the ESG (Environmental, Social and Governance) sub-committee of the SIC where three of our members delivered a very strong and impactful presentation to the Director, the entire SIC and the Division of Investment’s attorney. Please see the presentation below and follow here for updates and next steps on this campaign as we continue to make inroads and alliances towards dismantling NJ’s investment in genocide, apartheid and ethnic cleansing in Palestine.

    SLIDE DECK from presentation to the ESG committee of State Investment CouncilDownload

  • CAIR Action NJ condemns New Jersey Division of Investment’s reinvestment of $15 million in Israeli bonds and continued investment in Palantir:

    Read the press release
  • Update from SIC meeting, 1/28/2026

    Update from SIC meeting, 1/28/2026

    Disappointing announcement:
    New 5 year Israel Bond purchase but inspirational turnout by supporters of Break the Bonds NJ at annual meeting.

    In our last post, we announced a campaign win, the non-renewal of the $20 million Israel bond that matured on November 1, 2025. In that post we said that while we would continue advocating for divestment of the remaining $10 million Israel bond that matures in 2028, we were going to shift our focus. We asked supporters to speak at the annual State Investment Council meeting on January 28, 2026, to call for the divestment of the $144 million in Palantir stock owned by the NJ Division of Investment.

    However, at the beginning of the meeting, much to our shock and disappointment, Shoaib Khan, the director of the DOI announced that he had unilaterally decided to buy a new Israel bond with $15 million of the $20 million that had been cashed out November 1st.

    Two members of the SIC, Adam Liebtag and Tom Bruno, went on record expressing strong displeasure that the advisory committee was not consulted prior to this purchase. Khan justified the decision to reinvest primarily on fiduciary grounds while Liebtag and Bruno countered that since Israel bond investment is contentious, the SIC should have been included in the decision. The only foreign debt that the NJ Division of Investment holds is to the state of Israel, so this decision was clearly politically motivated.

    More than 20 people spoke strongly during public comments and many others wrote in to the State Investment Council to express their demand that the Division of Investment divest from Israel bonds and Palantir. Speakers were from a wide range of community and political organizations and perspectives. There were faith-based speakers, union members, academics, state pension holders and immigrant rights activists all united around the call to divest NJ from Israel bonds and Palantir.

    Here are some highlights of the powerful comments that were made:

    “We learned that the failure of the ESG (Environmental, Social & Governance) policy to reinvest in Israel Bonds was because a routine process was used instead. The fact that “routine process” does not include ethics is extremely concerning and is a failure of leadership.”

    Dillon Washington, DivestNJ

    “As a historian, by your logic of fiduciary duty, I’d like you to think about companies you would have invested in in 1935 Germany. You would have invested in the most profitable companies at the time, which would have been those funded by the German state: government bonds that funded weapons, the German rail industry that funded the deportation of Jews, and IG Farben and Krupp that funded the creation of Auschwitz and the gas chambers. These were the companies that eroded the civil rights and human rights of people across Europe.”

    Myles Drake Zhang, historian

    “Today I speak with a heavy heart but with firm conviction: our pension funds and tax dollars should not be invested in systems that harm human rights, fuel surveillance, or enable brutality at home and abroad. This reversal signals that short-term financial considerations are being placed above serious moral and humanitarian concerns.”

    Omayma Mansour, Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR)

    “Palantir is guilty of profiting from human rights abuses in Palestine and in the United States. Social responsible investment is the will of our people.“

    Rev. Annie Allen, pastor, Rutherford Congregational Church; Justice and Witness Taskforce, NJ Association of the United Church of Christ; Faith in NJ

    “If we continue to invest in war profiteering we will see the world around us crumble.”

    Haleima Twam, Palestinian American Community Center (PACC)

    “Palantir’s core business—large-scale data analytics tied to surveillance, law enforcement, and military operations—places the company at the center of persistent legal, ethical, and regulatory scrutiny. These risks are not abstract. They can translate into contract cancellations, litigation costs, employee attrition, consumer backlash, and heightened regulatory oversight, all of which directly affect shareholder value.”

    Aly Azhar, Emgage Action

    “I’m here with others to urge the Division of Investment to move quickly to divert the $144 million in Palantir stock toward the plethora of other businesses that are profitable without breaking the law, ignoring due process, or knowingly or willingly participating in genocide”.

    Rachael Bane, Green Party of NJ

    “The Division of Investment’s ESG policy prohibits investment in companies that show disregard for stakeholders’ rights. Palantir’s decision-making process is generally considered undemocratic. It is a highly centralized system controlled by its three founders, often described as an oligarchy.”

    Meera Jaffrey, Ceasefire Now NJ

    “As an electrical engineer that has studied machine learning and AI, AI is not as smart as people say it is, it’s only as good as the data that you give it and the data that police and military give it is usually racially biased.”

    Anthony Lee, Democratic Socialists of America

    “We shouldn’t be investing in a company that is destroying people’s lives. Stop investing in Israel. Stop investing in Palantir!”

    Donna Ristorucci, Ceasefire Now NJ

    “On behalf of fellow union members at Rutgers, we urgently call upon NJ to divest pensions from Palantir that has built a massive surveillance infrastructure that is built to limit people’s privacy and freedom. For now immigrants are the target of Palantir’s system, but the implications for our rights and privacy is a grave concern to all Americans as well as people abroad. Alex Karp at Palantir is on record saying that he and Palantir are proud of their technologies that kill and detain people and that they want to end public education.”

    Britt Paris, Rutgers University Faculty

    “Palantir is a monster. It has profited from the suffering of people in Gaza and the US, and has facilitated the invasion of Venezuela as well as actively facilitating the invasion of Iran and Colombia.”

    Lily Benavides, Green Party of NJ

    “Palantir is a company that profits from surveillance, repression, and human suffering. New Jersey’s public employees and taxpayers deserve better. We demand that New Jersey divest from Israel bonds and from Palantir—and ensure that our investments reflect our values of justice, human rights, and moral accountability.”

    Mindy Greenspan, JVP Northern NJ

    Stay tuned for next steps, calls to action and ways you can plug into this growing fight to withdraw NJ’s the material support and complicity in the ongoing genocide and occupation of Palestine.

    See media coverage of the SIC meeting below:

    NJ pension pressed to ditch tech firm Palantir over ICE enforcement

  • Exciting update on Break the Bonds NJ win

    Next steps to work towards Divestment from Israeli genocide: Divest NJ from Palantir.

    We want to announce that thanks to all of our advocacy, in November, we successfully influenced the NJ Division of Investment to not renew $20 million in Israel bonds. To be clear, this is not full divestment. New Jersey still owns $10.1 million in Israel bonds which will mature in 2028. It is also important to say that the NJ decision makers made no public announcement of this decision. We learned through analysis of publicly available investments.

    BUT it is still an important victory that directly impacts Israel’s ability to fund its genocidal practices. We decided not to publicly announce the victory when we learned about it in November because we were concerned about the delicate situation with the transition to a new governor. We’re planning a public announcement about this victory for our movement in the near future.

    Our goal right now is to connect with everyone who signed up for this campaign — like you — to understand your strengths and how we can work together more powerfully moving forward.
    We hope we can still count on your commitment to help us damage Israel’s financial power, to end the occupation, apartheid, and genocide. With the momentum from this win, we’re launching our next divestment push using the same strategy that helped us achieve our first goal. This time, we’re targeting the tech company Palantir, which provides digital surveillance technology to Israel and other repressive institutions around the world — including ICE. The NJ Division of Investment holds a whopping $144 million in Palantir stock.

    There are three ways you can plug in!

    1. Attend and give public comment at meetings of the New Jersey State Investment Council over Zoom. These are where investment decisions get made.
      The next one is Wednesday January 28th at 10:30 AM. Here are some talking points, as well as the registration link. We encourage you to bring in your own story to make your comments even more powerful.
    2. We’re holding monthly campaign meetings where we talk about the strategy, give updates, and share opportunities for action. Please email us back if you would be interested in joining those?
    3. We’re forming a special committee for people who want to be more hands-on — helping grow the campaign and shape strategy. This is for folks who want to go deeper. Let us know if this is something you might want to explore? Thank you so much for being part of this work — it’s really because of people like you that we’ve been able to win so far.

    Please follow us on Instagram @breakthebondsnj and email us at info@breakthebondsnj.org.