In J.R.R. Tolkien’s “The Lord of the Rings,” a Palantir is a seeing stone used to watch over faraway places and communicate great distances. Users had to “possess great strength of will and of mind” to direct the stone’s gaze to its full capability.

But when wielded by those without wisdom or a moral compass, Palantirs could be used to warp the truth and create distorted versions of reality.

Such is the dual potential, as well, of the company named after those stones and headquartered in Colorado, a company that has become one of the most powerful and secretive companies in the world.

Palantir is now woven into the fabric of America’s national security, health care, immigration enforcement, transportation and data collection networks.

Palantir’s software, which sees unseen patterns in data, helps militaries fight wars, Health and Human Services track pandemic outbreaks, and the CIA find bad guys. It also helps ICE find undocumented immigrants, and enables the government to collect huge amounts of data on Americans for uncertain purposes.

The company is often credited with helping find Osama bin Laden so Navy SEALs could kill him, something the company neither confirms nor denies.

It just won a $10 billion contract with the U.S. Army to enhance AI-driven capabilities and streamline procurement.

As a result of all its government contracts, Palantir’s stock just went on a 2,500% run. Founders Peter Thiel and Alex Karp have each seen their net worth jump by $17 billion collectively this year.

It’s now one of the top 10 tech companies in the world, with a valuation of $448 billion, more than any other defense contractor.

So why is this tech juggernaut, with tentacles all over the world, based here in Colorado, in a nondescript building in lower downtown Denver?

Well, for one, to get away from the suffocating climate of Silicon Valley, according to Karp. He has criticized Silicon Valley for its monoculture and intolerance. He’s praised Colorado as “sane and pleasant,” calling out Silicon Valley’s “woke mob.” 

“Denver felt like a Palantir sort of place,” Sam Rascoff, a longtime adviser to Palantir and friend of Karp’s, told 5280 magazine about the move. “There’s a diversity of perspective and viewpoints on issues, and that’s important to us, because we work in areas where complexity is the rule.”

In a letter to Karp obtained by 5280, Gov. Jared Polis assured him that “Colorado shares and embodies Palantir’s vision of promoting national security and economic development through innovation,” adding that “Palantir’s national security primacy would be further cemented by becoming a lead industrial anchor in a forward-looking state that is primed to serve as an international leader in the economy of the future.”

Indeed, Palantir is acting as a magnet company for other tech firms, reinforcing Colorado’s position as a fast-growing secondary tech hub to Silicon Valley.

But not all is copacetic between Palantir and Colorado.

Protesters gathered outside Denver’s Union Station in a recent rally against Palantir and its role in developing AI used by Israel Defense Forces to spy on and target Palestinians.

Palantir also has faced criticism from Denver politicians for collecting the data that is helping ICE agents deport the undocumented immigrants that Denver let into the city by the thousands and sought to protect.

At a conference, the director of ICE called Palantir the Amazon Prime of deportation.

Thirteen former employees signed an open letter in May, calling Palantir’s work with immigration enforcement “normalizing authoritarianism.”

Palantir officials have responded that the company assesses every contract for violations of its own principles on civil liberties and privacy, and that those complaining ex-employees represent only a handful of its 4,000 workers.

In another possible hitch in the Colorado relationship, Polis signed what’s believed to be first-in-the-nation legislation  to regulate artificial intelligence as a consumer protection measure, which Palantir and other tech companies lobbied against. Now Polis may be rethinking his stance about states regulating AI individually, and the AI bill may see major revisions in the legislative special session next week. You can’t help wonder if Palantir is whispering in his ear.

So how did Palantir go from tech outsider to belle of the ball?

Credit has to go to Palantir’s founders Thiel and Karp, the ultimate tech odd couple. Thiel is now chairman and Karp CEO.

Thiel’s a German-born American entrepreneur who cofounded PayPal with Elon Musk. He has been described as a techno-libertarian and a crucial supporter of Donald Trump’s first presidential campaign and longtime patron of Vice President J.D. Vance. (Steve Carell’s character in the satirical movie “Mountainhead” was modeled on Thiel.)

He has said in the past that technology will replace politics and has expressed skepticism that democracy and freedom can always coexist.

The wild-haired Karp, on the other hand, has described himself as “progressive but not woke,” and supported both President Joe Biden and Kamala Harris. Born in New York and raised outside Philadelphia, Karp has a Jewish father and a Black mother who were social activists who took young Alex to civil rights marches and other protests.

But both leaders were pro-military and America First at a time when that wasn’t so popular in Silicon Valley.

Both men have made the government, and particularly the U.S. national-security apparatus, its most important customer, refusing to do business with China, Russia or other countries that are opposed to the West.

Now that orientation is paying off with Trump back in office.

“We have a consistently pro-Western view that the West has a superior way of living and organizing itself, especially if we live up to our aspirations,” Karp told columnist Maureen Dowd in a fascinating interview.

But both Thiel and Karp have been fairly secretive, even mysterious, about the specifics of how Palantir’s software is used by various companies and governments, including Israel, Trump and Ukraine.

Colorado state Sen. Julie Gonzales, whose district includes Palantir’s headquarters, said this to 5280: “We’ve got a company that’s been the steroid injected into the ICE surveillance infrastructure, in a city where people have actively fought for immigrant rights, and we can’t get answers on some very basic questions. I’m mystified.”

That secretiveness has opened the door to questions about all the power they have amassed and their intentions: Are they becoming America’s Big Brother, with access to too much of our personal data? Will they lead us through an intelligence revolution via a symbiotic partnership with AI, or accidentally create the killer robots that will one day turn on us?

I can’t help wonder if Palantir’s move to Denver was an effort to keep its profile low so its work might stay in the shadows and avoid more controversy in the future.

For Tolkien, who was prescient in showing how the corroding power of magical technology can turn even good men into Gollums, the story of the Palantir actually ends well. When the evil Sauron gains control of a Palantir stone, allowing him to dominate and influence those who look into others, Middle Earth goes through a period of great darkness.

But by the end of Tolkien’s trilogy, Aragorn, who is crowned king of Arnor and Gondor in “The Return of the King,” has found the strength of will to master the stone without falling under Sauron’s sway.

Let’s pray that Thiel and Karp are our Aragorns and not our Saurons.