French tech giant Capgemini is divesting a US subsidiary that held a contract with US Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
In a press release on Sunday, Capgemini said that “legal constraints” stopped it from controlling this subsidiary’s operations.
Capgemini has come under pressure from French lawmakers and its trade union over a contract its subsidiary signed with ICE. Capgemini Government Solutions has been under contract since December to provide software that can detect and locate foreign nationals, public records showed.
Last week, Capgemini’s CEO Aiman Ezzat wrote on LinkedIn that the company was recently made aware of “the nature and scope of this work.” He added that the work raised questions about what the business and tech firm typically does.
The company said the subsidiary made up 0.4% of its revenue last year, and the process to divest it would begin immediately. The $26 billion software firm is among France’s largest listed companies.
Capgemini Government Solutions did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The recent fatal shootings of American citizens Renee Nicole Good and Alex Pretti by federal immigration agents in Minneapolis have sparked protests and calls to boycott certain businesses.
On Friday’s “National Shutdown,” organizers called for a 24-hour general strike, asking students to skip school, business owners to close up shop, and consumers to refrain from spending. The strike was set up to protest the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown and the fatal shooting of Renee Good and Alex Pretti by federal agents in Minneapolis.
Podcaster Scott Galloway asked Americans to “opt out” and “unsubscribe” from services like OpenAI’s ChatGPT, Amazon’s Prime Video, and Microsoft Office for February to pressure large companies whose leaders have President Donald Trump’s ear.
“Small changes in consumer behavior — starting on the first day of February — could have an enormous ripple effect, one that extends all the way to the White House,” Galloway wrote in a blog post about the boycott.
Another petition signed by hundreds of tech workers, titled “Tech demands ICE out of our cities,” calls on tech leaders to “pick up the phone” and call the White House to demand that ICE agents “leave our cities.”
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