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More than 800 US technology workers have signed a petition urging chief executives to demand the Trump administration remove US Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents from American cities and cancel government contracts involving the agency.
The call to action follows recent attempts by business leaders in Minnesota who asked for de-escalation as tensions grew over the presence of ICE agents in the state.
The petition stated: “We know our industry leaders have leverage: in October, they persuaded Trump to call off a planned ICE surge in San Francisco. Now they need to go further, and join us in demanding ICE out of all of our cities.”
Backlash after Minneapolis killing
The petition emerged shortly after the killing of a 37-year-old nurse, Alex Pretti, in Minneapolis by ICE agents over the weekend. The incident, which came soon after their killing of Renee Good, fueled a widespread backlash involving Reddit users, registered nurses, faith leaders, and the National Rifle Association.
Petition supporters argue that high-profile technology executives are uniquely positioned to engage with federal officials. In October, the Trump administration appeared to reverse plans for an ICE surge in San Francisco after appeals attributed to Nvidia’s Jensen Huang and Salesforce Chief Executive Marc Benioff. The US president wrote at the time on social media: “Friends of mine who live in the area called last night to ask me not to go forward with the surge.”
Signatories to the current petition include nearly one hundred Google employees and dozens from Meta, Amazon, and OpenAI, with an unnamed 'Exec VP' from Tesla also listed.
Tech leaders divided on response
Some technology executives have spoken publicly since Pretti’s killing while others have remained silent. Anthropic chief executive Dario Amodei posted on X about the importance of “preserving democratic values and rights at home.”
OpenAI Head of Global Business James Dyett wrote on X: “There is far more outrage from tech leaders over a wealth tax than masked ICE agents terrorizing communities and executing civilians in the streets. Tells you what you need to know about the values of our industry.”
Neither OpenAI’s Sam Altman, Nvidia’s Huang nor Apple Chief Executive Tim Cook have posted about the incident. Cook was among a group of technology executives at the White House for a private documentary screening about Trump's wife Melania on Saturday, joined by Zoom Chief Executive Eric Yuan.
Petition organizers said tech workers had been largely silent on politics during the first year of the Trump administration, yet attitudes are shifting. A Google DeepMind Researcher wrote: “It’ll be pretty hard to do good research in a ‘masked men execute civilians on the street’ political environment. That possibility grows and you should plan for it.”
