Canadian banks, pension funds have poured billions into ICE contractors

Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents escort a detained immigrant into an elevator after he exited an immigration courtroom on Tuesday, June 17, 2025, in New York. (AP Photo/Olga Fedorova, file)

OTTAWA — Major Canadian banks and pension funds provided tens of billions of dollars to American contractors for the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency, an investigation by the non-profit Stand.earth has found.

The group’s analysis of loan and share data found Canadian financial institutions backed multiple companies that have major contracts with ICE to provide equipment or services, through investments, loans and bonds totalling about US$35 billion.

The companies that benefited from those Canadian investments include: data analytics firm Palantir; major U.S. defence contractors General Dynamics and L3Harris; the IT firm CACI; and telecom giant AT&T. CoreCivic and Geo Group, which construct and manage detention centres, also benefited to a lesser extent.

Palantir, founded by major Republican donor Peter Thiel, supplies technology to ICE that helps it track individuals for detention and deportation.

Richard Brooks, finance director with Stand.earth, said Canadians should be alarmed to learn their savings and pensions are supporting U.S. President Donald Trump’s violent immigration crackdown and mass deportation campaign.

“We think it’s important for Canadians to know that their money -- their savings in the bank, their mortgage or their hard-earned pension -- is not agnostic money. It is actually being used to invest and attempt to profit from the violence that is happening in the United States right now,” Brooks told The Canadian Press, and called on Parliament to conduct hearings.

Left-wing politicians reacted sharply to news of the reported transactions. Newly elected NDP Leader Avi Lewis said Canadian businesses and public pensions should not provide support to “Trump`s personal military arm.”

“Canadians are scandalized by ICE, and we’ve been consistent as a party across this country that we don’t think that Canadian businesses should be doing business with ICE,” Lewis told a news conference Monday in Winnipeg. “We certainly don’t think Canadian pension funds should be investing in the infrastructure of repression in the United States.”

NDP MP Jenny Kwan said the Stand.earth report demonstrates the need for “greater transparency and accountability” and a “reassessment” of the ethical frameworks guiding public pensions and financial institutions.

Stand.earth has closely tracked the role played by Canadian banks in backing oil and gas operations.

By analyzing financial data from the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission and the private financial data firm LSEG, it found the Canada Pension Plan, nine other public pensions and all of Canada’s major banks invested in companies that have multimillion-dollar contracts with ICE.

Brooks said Canadian banks TD, RBC, Scotiabank, CIBC and BMO have collectively provided these companies with financing through loans and bonds worth more than US$23 billion since 2020. The banks, along with financial services firm Desjardins, together invested at least US$9.8 billion in the ICE-connected firms, he said.

Public pensions have invested more than US$2.5 billion in these companies, Brooks said. The Canada Pension Plan is by far the biggest investor, followed by Caisse de Depot et de Placement du Quebec, British Columbia Investment Management and PSP investments, among others.

Brooks said he was most surprised to learn the CPP invested US$1.6 billion in the companies. The California Public Employees Retirement System invested roughly the same amount.

“For CPP to be investing to the same scale that the largest pension fund in the United States is investing in these companies, that really blew me away. It made me think they’re no better than U.S. pensions, and they should be better because we have different values in Canada,” Brooks said.

ICE has been mired in controversy and pursued by lawsuits over its agents’ aggressive tactics and alleged violations of civil rights while rounding up vast numbers of immigrants for deportation.

Federal agents fatally shot two U.S. citizens in Minnesota during the immigration enforcement operation in that state. Dozens of people, including a Canadian, have died in ICE custody after being detained since January 2025, when Trump was inaugurated.

Various Canadian pension funds and banks declined comment. The Canadian Bankers Association said it would not comment on individual decisions by members.

Banks and pension funds are federally regulated entities and the finance minister is directly responsible for the Canada Pension Plan.

Finance Minister Francois-Philippe Champagne’s office said it’s up to those institutions -- which operate at arm’s length from government -- to decide independently how they invest their funds.

“Canadian pension funds, much like banks and other financial institutions in Canada, are governed and managed independently -- and operate in a commercial manner at arm’s length from federal and provincial governments,” said spokesperson John Fragos.

“Their investment strategies are theirs to own, and guided by independent and professional boards of directors, who oversee, among other things, risk management and investment policies. Questions on individual investment transactions should be directed toward them.”

He said the federal government is currently “seized with creating an attractive domestic investment profile” and drawing in more private investment.

Brooks said that response tells him the government wants to pass the buck.

The federal government itself has also awarded contracts and subsidies to some ICE contractors.

The tech publication The Logic has reported that Ottawa-based tech company JSI, which provides wiretapping tools to ICE, is getting $1 million in federal funds to commercialize AI products for law enforcement and security agencies.

National Defence awarded Palantir’s Canadian subsidiary with a $14.4 million software contract in 2020, according to documents tabled in Parliament last year.

Many Canadians were also scandalized to learn last year that Brampton-based vehicle manufacturer Roshel was selling armoured vehicles to ICE.

By Kyle Duggan.