Microsoft Staff Demand End to Work With Border Patrol

More than 100 Microsoft employees have signed an open letter demanding that the software giant end its contracts with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcment, saying they “refuse to be complicit” with the Border Patrol’s forced-separation policy. The Trump administration is facing a storm of criticism over its policy of separating of children from their families at the Mexican border. “We request that Microsoft cancel its contracts with ICE, and with other clients who directly enable ICE,” read the letter. “As the people who build the technologies that Microsoft profits from, we refuse to be complicit.” The letter, which was addressed to Chief Executive Satya Nadella and published in The New York Times, pointed to a $19.4 million contract that Microsoft has with ICE for processing data and artificial-intelligence capabilities. Microsoft said its technology was not being used for “projects related to separating children from their families at the border,” adding: “Microsoft is dismayed by the forcible separation of children from their families.”