Tell Congress: Audit Shady Taxpayer-Funded Venture Fund
Call ONE of the Representatives. Note: only one of these Congressmembers represents you. Find out which one here.
Call Script
My name is __________. I am a constituent, and my zip code is _______. I am a member of Indivisible SF.
I’m calling to ask that [MoC] request a GAO audit of Palantir and other In-Q-Tel investments with past, active, or pending federal contracts to see if taxpayers are paying twice.
In-Q-Tel invests CIA funds into private businesses. It has a history of shady business practices and lack of transparency. We demand confirmation that the American people aren’t footing the bill for the same technologies twice. If our tax dollars seeded it, we shouldn’t be paying again in federal contracts.
I also ask that [MoC] push the IRS to investigate whether In-Q-Tel, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit, has provided undue private benefit, especially to members of its Board of Trustees.
A 2016 investigation by the Wall Street Journal found that nearly half of In-Q-Tel’s Board members had a financial connection with a company In-Q-Tel had funded.
And finally, I ask that [MoC] investigate whether In-Q-Tel was transparent with Congress about the equity sales it made, particularly to foreign entities.
Background
In-Q-Tel (IQT) is a venture capital fund that gets taxpayer money through the CIA every year. In exchange for investing, In-Q-Tel gets perpetual use licenses to benefit the federal government. IQT’s transparency is extremely low, foregoing the usual federal procurement processes and often backing companies where its Board members have financial ties. It also receives equity in exchange for investing, and can pretty much guarantee that the companies it backs will receive lucrative federal contracts, so why does it need more public funding every year? Does it ever back competing firms, or does it follow its double-dipping Board members’ financial incentives and erect monopolies that can name their price in federal contracts? Is anyone ensuring that the technology procured through government contracts is not the same technology that’s covered by the perpetual use licenses?
Meet the CIA-backed venture fund behind Palantir, Anduril—and a spy tool that might be on your phone, Fortune, 7/29/2025
The CIA’s Venture-Capital Firm, Like Its Sponsor, Operates in the Shadows, WSJ, 8/30/2016
In-Q-Tel: The CIA’s Investment Firm, Grey Dynamics, 2/16/2025
Development Agreement, SEC, 11/12/2010
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