The backlash from U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE)’s controversial tactics isn’t just affecting companies in the U.S.; it’s also trickling overseas.
Aiman Ezzat, the chief executive officer of French consulting and information technology company Capgemini, posted on LinkedIn announcing plans to sell a U.S. division that does business with ICE.
CNN reports the company leader’s decision stems from a revelation that the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) awarded the division in question a $4.8 million contract back in December 2025 to assist the agency with “skip tracing services” — the process used to locate people who are difficult to find by the use of online information and other sources — like voter registration data. “We were recently made aware, through public sources, of the nature of a contract awarded to CGS by DHS’s Immigration and Customs Enforcement in December 2025,” Ezzat wrote in the lengthy post.
“The nature and scope of this work has raised questions compared to what we typically do as a business and technology firm.”
Details of the contract were uncovered by Paris-based corporate watchdog group Multinationals Observatory, whose reporting sparked questions from France’s finance and economy minister, Roland Lescure. The watchdog posted an archived webpage revealing Capgemini was working with ICE to “help it minimize the time required and cost incurred to remove all removable illegal aliens from the US.”
Between 2016 and now, companies have gone back and forth about whether or not to stand up against the Trump administration and its
controversial tactics, especially in the wake of violence. After the murders of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor in 2020, major corporations stood up for social justice, putting initiatives in place to support Black businesses and others affected by racial injustice and systemic barriers.As several companies bowed down to the administration following the 2025 inauguration, things have turned sour after three U.S. citizens, Keith Porter, Jr., Renee Good, and Alex Pretti, were killed by ICE agents, sparking national and global protests. Canadian politicians urged the real estate company The Jim Pattison Group to halt the sale of an industrial building in Ashland, Virginia, to ICE, and they succeeded.
According to The Washington Post, Niki Sharma, British Columbia’s attorney general, said the province was watching “in horror” the events that took place
in Minneapolis and encouraged Canadian business executives “to think about their role in what is unfolding there.”Another Canadian business, social media management firm Hootsuite, responded to protesters who surrounded its Vancouver headquarters after it was revealed the company held a contract with ICE’s public affairs office. While Hootsuite CEO Irina Novoselsky acknowledged ICE’s recent activities as “wrong” and called the killings “devastating,” she defended the contract, saying the company is simply providing social media support over surveillance tools to ICE.
Here in the U.S., major retailers like Target and Best Buy, and Silicon Valley, called for a “de-escalation of tensions.” Small businesses in metro cities are taking matters into their own hands and being celebrated by local politicians. In a post on X, Oklahoma City Mayor David Holt praised the property owners for deciding to end discussions
of a sale to DHS. “I commend the owners for their decision and thank them on behalf of the people of Oklahoma City,” Holt said.“As Mayor, I ask that every single property owner in Oklahoma City exhibit the same concern for our community in the days ahead.”
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