Boston Dynamics staff protest company's robot-dog sale to ICE
More than 300 employees signed a petition against a $1.3 million deal to supply modified Spot robots to ICE, but executives are standing by it.
What happened: In early September, more than 300 Boston Dynamics employees - out of roughly 1,400 total staff, half signing anonymously - sent executives a petition urging them to cancel a deal to supply US Immigration and Customs Enforcement with modified versions of the company's Spot robot. The petition surfaced after the Department of Homeland Security awarded a $1.3 million contract on September 25 to Connecticut firm Radeco, which builds a Spot-based platform called Cerberus for ICE. Boston Dynamics leadership, in an email from former interim CEO Amanda McMaster, said it would proceed with the deal and asked workers to accept the decision even if they disagreed.
Why it matters: The fight is really about who ICE is and what it does. Boston Dynamics says the robots go mainly to Homeland Security Investigations, a unit focused on cartels and smuggling. But that same unit redirected agents toward deportations and workplace raids under Trump, including a September 4 raid that detained 475 workers, mostly South Korean, at a Hyundai plant in Georgia. Hyundai owns Boston Dynamics, which is why employees specifically cited that raid - some called it an attack on their own colleagues - as a reason the ICE contract crosses a line for them.
How it works, plainly: The contract covers four Spot robots modified by Radeco into the Cerberus platform, built to sense radiation, toxic gas leaks and explosives in tunnels or disaster zones, and to check that air is breathable before people enter confined spaces. It carries 30x zoom and 360-degree cameras plus infrared imaging, can run inspection missions with little human input, and can add a robotic arm to open doors or manipulate objects. DHS justified the purchase as support for dismantling smuggling tunnels used by cartels and trafficking networks.
The rollout: Boston Dynamics says Spot cannot be weaponized under its sale terms, which bar using the robot to harm, intimidate or arm against any person or animal, and that it would void warranties and cut off a customer caught violating those rules - something it says has never happened with DHS. The company is simultaneously opening a $100 million robotics facility in Waltham, Massachusetts, aiming for 1,250 new jobs by 2033. Petition signers warn the ICE association could make that hiring push, and retaining current staff, harder.