Palantir’s MAGA CEO After the Midterms: ‘I’ve Been a Democrat My Whole Life’

Palantir has donated millions to Donald Trump since 2024, with the company’s CEO personally donating roughly $1.9 million to the president’s super PAC and inaugural fund. But now that the Democrats have won the House and Senate in a landslide, Karp wants to let you in on a little secret. He’s supposedly been a Democrat this whole time. “I’ve been a Democrat my whole life. I grew up in a far left environment. I know more about being a progressive than almost anybody on the planet, and I absolutely believe Palantir—all of our products are essentially progressive,” Karp said in a new interview published Wednesday. Karp also addressed Trump’s recent comments to 60 Minutes that perhaps he had “gone too far” on the ICE crackdowns, claiming he was “really happy to hear the president” say that. “I’m glad he’s saying in public now what I’ve been saying in private,” Karp told Politico. Karp also suggested he’s open to voting for a Democrat in 2028 as long as the nominee isn’t a socialist. A quick glance at Karp’s public statements over the past two years tells a different story about his relationship to Trump. Palantir has profited handsomely from government contracts since Trump retook power, securing billions in obligations from the U.S. Department of Defense and millions from ICE, significantly more than the company made in previous years under President Joe Biden. Karp used to praise Trump’s handling of immigration policy, as you’d expect from anyone making so much money from those policies. “I’m really supportive of the president’s, you know, border and national security thing,” Karp told Fox News in Oct. 2025. Back in 2025, Karp also called Trump a “peace president,” and flatly said “I support the president a lot,” even though people might think he’s “nuts” for saying as much. Palantir’s Alex Karp on ICE: pic.twitter.com/4yaUcIK30c — Adam Wren (@adamwren) November 11, 2026 There’s truth to the idea that Karp was raised a Democrat. He’s previously talked about growing up in a liberal household. When he was interviewed by Wired in Nov. 2025, Karp became defensive when asked about his personal relationship with Trump, comparing the question to how he talks with his liberal family members. Do you have a relationship with Trump? It depends how you define “relationship.” He’s the president of the United States, and I very much respect that. I agree with him on some things, and probably on some things I don’t. Do you like him? I think he’s done a much better job than you think he’s done. Let’s not use me. In the positioning of your question, you’re not neutral. Talking to you is just like talking to my family. It’s like where me and my family disagree. And I’ll tell you where those places are. They’re on the border, they’re in Israel, and they’re in Ukraine. I get yelled at all day about those three issues. But everything Karp has done since 2024 would suggest that he’s all-in on President Trump’s version of fascism, no matter what he professes now. Karp’s apparent affection for fascism isn’t just a recent thing either. In 2016, the Palantir CEO hired Louis Mosely, the grandson of UK fascist organizers Oswald Mosely, who’s now head of the company’s UK operations. Karp reportedly recited from memory some of Mosely’s pro-Nazi speech in 1939 about seeking peace with Adolf Hitler. Karp is almost comically stereotypical as a man who saw Trump take power in 2025 and expected the purge of Biden-era liberals to become the new normal forever. The Palantir CEO even started using a slur for developmentally disabled people again, something that had been largely pushed out of polite society during the more progressive era of President Barack Obama. “If Silicon Valley believes we are going to take away everyone’s white-collar job … and you’re gonna screw the military, if you don’t think that’s gonna lead to nationalization of our technology, you’re retarded,” Karp said at a16z’s American Dynamism Summit 2026 in March. “You might be particularly retarded, because you have a 160 IQ.” The pendulum has swung back with Democrats sweeping the midterms. Woke 3 is upon us, and the tech oligarchs are scrambling to catch up. Palantir hired former Democratic senator Jon Tester as an advisor. There’s no denying that Karp may have held different political beliefs at one time. Journalist Sharon Weinberger dug up a photo of Karp wearing a keffiyeh, published in the book Valley of Death. But that doesn’t mean Karp is still a liberal or progressive. He’s a military contractor whose fortunes are tied to having a good relationship with the government. Sometimes those relationships will be with Democrats, and sometimes they’ll be with Republicans. And many oligarchs around the world don’t really care about politics so much as they care about getting paid. The question remains whether Karp’s political pivot will pay dividends in a Democratic controlled Congress. Especially since the Pentagon’s overreliance on Palantir’s tech has been blamed for atrocities like the bombing of an elementary school in Iran that killed at least 150 people, most of them children.