
Key points:
The rise of Palantir: From CIA pet project to public surveillance giant
Founded in 2003 by Peter Thiel and Alex Karp, Palantir Technologies was birthed in the shadows of post-9/11 militarization, with its earliest funding coming from In-Q-Tel—the CIA’s venture capital arm. For years, its sole client was the U.S. intelligence community, where its software allegedly played a role in tracking down Osama bin Laden. But Palantir’s expansion into civilian life has been anything but benign. By 2020, when the company went public, it had already entrenched itself in public health surveillance through Operation Warp Speed, using its Tiberius platform to manage vaccine distribution and clinical trials.
The CDC also relied on Palantir’s systems to monitor COVID-19 spread, effectively turning public health into a data-harvesting operation. "This isn’t about safety — it’s about control," said one privacy advocate who spoke on condition of anonymity. "When a company with ties to the CIA starts dictating who is a 'terrorist' for protesting, we’ve crossed into dystopia."
Gallagher’s crusade: Silencing dissent, from TikTok to Palestine
Gallagher’s hostility toward free speech isn’t new. As a congressman, he spearheaded efforts to ban TikTok, framing the platform as a hotbed of "pro-Hamas propaganda" rather than acknowledging it as a space for organic dissent. His sudden resignation from Congress — followed by an immediate jump to Palantir — raises ethical red flags, particularly given his pivotal vote approving military aid to Israel just days before joining the company.
Now, as a Palantir executive, Gallagher is escalating his rhetoric, branding protesters as "brainwashed" and "dangerous." His call to mobilize "all legal mechanisms" against them echoes the post-9/11 playbook, where dissent was conflated with terrorism to justify mass surveillance. "This is the same logic used to justify the Patriot Act," said constitutional lawyer John Whitehead. "Only now, it’s being outsourced to corporate enforcers like Palantir."
The endgame: A corporate Stasi in the making
Palantir’s ambitions extend far beyond Gallagher’s inflammatory soundbites. Its software has been deployed everywhere from war zones to hospital systems, creating an omnipresent architecture of surveillance. With advisors like former CIA director George Tenet and Condoleezza Rice, the company operates as an unaccountable extension of the security state — one that profits from perpetual crisis.
The implications are dire. If protesting injustice is redefined as "domestic terrorism," then Palantir’s algorithms—trained on biased data—could be weaponized to target activists, journalists, and ordinary citizens. "They’re not just watching us," warned journalist Whitney Webb. "They’re building the system that will decide who gets to speak at all."
As Gallagher and Palantir push for a new era of suppression, the question isn’t whether they’ll succeed—but whether the public will wake up before it’s too late.
Sources include:
InformationLiberation.com
NYPost.com
PBSTwimg.com
PBSTwimg.com
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