How ICE’s new software tools could speed up deportations

Photograph: Reuters

Feb 18th 2026|7 min read

GOVERNMENT NOTICES on software contracts rarely make for intriguing reading. Yet one published on April 17th 2025 by America’s Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), the muscle behind President Donald Trump’s crackdown on undocumented immigrants, stood out. The agency was urgently seeking a powerful new artificial-intelligence model to find and prioritise individuals eligible for deportation—ranging from those who overstayed their visas to violent criminals. A prototype of the “streamlined end-to-end immigration lifecycle” software, called ImmigrationOS, was to be delivered by Palantir, an American data-analysis giant, by the end of September.