A Warning from the Clinton White House

Robert Reich isn't pulling punches. The former Labor Secretary under President Bill Clinton took to his YouTube channel Tuesday to deliver what amounts to a full-throated alarm about Palantir Technologies Inc. (PLTR), calling it "the most dangerous corporation in America." His concern? That the Silicon Valley data analytics giant is building surveillance tools that could threaten basic freedoms as it embeds itself deeper into federal government operations.

The company's name itself, Reich noted, should tell you something. In the Lord of the Rings trilogy, a Palantir is a "seeing stone" used to spy on people and distort truth. According to Reich, that parallel isn't coincidental. The real-world Palantir sells "AI-based data platforms" to governments, militaries, and law enforcement agencies capable of analyzing "massive amounts of your personal data." The similarity, he argues, is deliberate and striking.

Building the Infrastructure of What, Exactly?

Reich's critique gets more pointed from there. He warned that "billions of your tax dollars are going to Palantir" and suggested those investments could eventually be turned against the very taxpayers funding them. Quoting investor Paul Graham, Reich said the company is essentially "building the infrastructure of the police state," creating systems where vast troves of data "can be used by a tyrant to intimidate or silence opposition."

The political dimension looms large in Reich's analysis. "We've already seen Trump target people or organizations he considers enemies," he said, raising the specter of a future where a President might choose to "punish or deny services to individual Americans based on their political affiliations." He also pointed to Palantir co-founder Peter Thiel, a prominent ally of President Donald Trump, noting that Thiel "has made no secret of his disdain for democracy."

Palantir Pushes Back Hard

Palantir has faced these accusations before and continues to firmly reject them. After Democratic lawmakers compared the company to Nazi collaborators in recent months, Palantir responded with an emphatic denial: "Palantir is not building a master database. Palantir is neither conducting nor enabling mass surveillance of American citizens." The company emphasized its two-decade transparent track record of working in partnership with the U.S. government.

CEO Alex Karp has been even more forceful in recent statements. "We are the single worst technology to use to abuse civil liberties, which is, by the way, the reason why we could never get the NSA or the FBI to actually buy our product," he said. The argument, essentially, is that Palantir's systems are designed in ways that make them poorly suited for the kind of mass surveillance Reich fears.

Palantir did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Reich's latest statements.

The Stock Keeps Climbing

Whatever the political controversy, investors seem unfazed. Shares of Palantir rose 1.91% on Tuesday, closing at $170.69, and gained another 0.64% in overnight trading. The stock continues to score high on momentum and growth metrics, with a favorable long-term price trend that suggests the market remains confident in the company's business trajectory despite the civil liberties debate swirling around it.

The tension here is real: a company at the intersection of government contracts, artificial intelligence, and data analytics will inevitably raise questions about privacy and power. Reich is betting that those questions matter more than the stock price suggests. Time will tell whether investors or critics have the better read on where this story goes next.