In 2008, Jeffrey Epstein was convicted of soliciting prostitution from a minor. That conviction is the fixed point in this story. Everything that follows happened after it.
Why? The system that should have removed Epstein from power instead credentialed him as someone the system couldn’t touch. The conviction didn’t function as punishment. It functioned as a rating agency.
In November 2014, Peter Thiel as the co-founder of Palantir Technologies, known for his long-standing Nazi beliefs, personally emailed this convicted sex offender to solicit $10 to $20 million for Valar Ventures. The venture capital fund Thiel had founded. Not a subordinate. Not an intermediary.
Thiel himself. With Epstein. Sex years after conviction. Oops, I mean six years.
A meeting followed in December 2014 at Epstein’s Manhattan townhouse, which was the same property that would become notorious as the location where numerous women said they were sexually abused.
Thiel brought with him two principals, Andrew McCormack and James Fitzgerald. Whatever happened in that infamous child sex abuse townhouse meant that by June 2015, Epstein had committed $15 million through his Southern Trust Company as a limited partner in a Valar Ventures fund.
That was not the end of the relationship.
It was the beginning.
As Nafeez Ahmed reports in Byline Times, more than 100 documents from the Epstein Files released by the US Department of Justice show that Thiel’s firm treated Epstein as an active premium partner for the next five years.
In June 2017, Valar Ventures sent Epstein exclusive investment opportunities marked “super confidential.” In November 2018, Thiel’s firm solicited additional capital from Epstein. As late as March 2019, four months before Epstein’s final arrest on federal sex trafficking charges, Epstein’s accountant was requesting detailed portfolio information for “presentation to Mr Epstein.”
The expanding investigation about abuse of underaged girls seemed only to deepen the Palantir relationships.
The original $15 million commitment grew to approximately $40 million. Epstein’s Valar Ventures stake is now worth approximately $170 million, making it the largest single asset in his estate.
Former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak described Thiel and Epstein as “owners” of the fund in an email released as part of the Epstein Files. Thiel’s spokesman of course denied the characterization yet also confirmed Epstein was a limited partner. Whether you call it ownership or partnership, Peter Thiel personally solicited a convicted sex offender’s money, hosted him as a premium investor, and maintained the relationship until Epstein’s suspicious suicide.
Now add the intelligence dimension.
Christopher Steele, former MI6 Russia desk head, assessed that Epstein’s fortune likely originated from the former Soviet Union and Russian organised crime.
The documentary record supports this. In 2015, Epstein recommended that Thiel meet Sergey Belyakov, an alumnus of the Russian FSB spy academy who had served as Putin’s Deputy Minister of Economic Development. Thiel’s assistant arranged an in-person meeting. In October 2016, Epstein arranged at least one meeting between Thiel and Vitaly Churkin, Russia’s Ambassador to the United Nations and a veteran Kremlin operative.
When Churkin died suddenly and suspiciously in February 2017, Epstein emailed Thiel:
My Russian ambassador friend died. Life is short, start with dessert.
Thiel later told the Wall Street Journal that the meeting contained “nothing memorable” and tried to DARVO the situation by falsely claiming himself the “rather naïve” victim.
Now add the UK infrastructure.
Palantir Technologies holds more than £670 million in UK Government contracts spanning nuclear weapons systems at the Atomic Weapons Establishment, NHS patient records, Ministry of Defence operations, and police intelligence databases. In September 2025, Palantir bizarrely grabbed a £240.6 million MoD contract without competitive tender, awarded under a “defence and security exemption.”
This system led by the man giving white supremacist extremist sermons of Nazi Lebensraum, funded through a fortune that MI6’s former Russia desk head assessed originated from Russian organised crime… now processes data across “all security classifications” for “critical strategic, tactical and live operational decision making” throughout Britain’s defence apparatus.
And how did Palantir take control over British defense? In 2018, while Epstein remained an active Valar partner receiving confidential investment opportunities, Palantir hired Peter Mandelson’s lobbying firm, Global Counsel. The explicit purpose was to position a toxic Palantir as a respectable partner to the British government. Global Counsel brought former Health Minister Nicola Blackwood on board for “political risk analysis.” Matthew Swindells, Deputy Chief Executive of NHS England until July 2019, joined Global Counsel two months after leaving and immediately began advising Palantir on NHS contracts. He went on to chair Palantir’s health advisory board while simultaneously chairing four NHS hospital trusts.
Mandelson, of course, had his own Epstein problem. Between 2009 and 2010, while serving as Business Secretary, he leaked market-sensitive government information to Jeffrey Epstein. When this came to light, the British government moved swiftly:
Mandelson was sacked as US Ambassador, resigned his Labour Party membership, and was forced to quit the House of Lords. He now faces potential criminal charges for misconduct in public office.
The principle established by Mandelson’s removal is unambiguous: those who compromise the UK’s secrets to a foreign intelligence-linked sexual predator forfeit their access to power.
That principle has not been applied to Palantir.
The company whose radical right-wing founder personally solicited a convicted sex offender as a business partner, who received meetings with Russian intelligence operatives through that sex offender, who hired the lobbying firm of a man now facing criminal charges for leaking state secrets to that same sex offender? That company? It now processes Britain’s nuclear weapons data, military operations across all classification levels, NHS patient records, and police intelligence.
Thiel, infamous lately for giving extremist sermons promoting “ACTS 17” Nazi Lebensraum, says he is the naive victim. We would be naive to believe him. Thiel targeting Epstein in 2014 to be his partner makes perfect sense. Epstein had just publicly survived a child sex trafficking process that should have destroyed him. That’s not a liability for Thiel. That’s a due diligence result. It told him the asset is protected.
The two also met with several CEOs for dinner in Palo Alto in Aug. 2015, which Epstein described as “wild”…. “Does my bad press give you pause?” Epstein asked Thiel in one email. Thiel’s response was unfazed: “If I was intimidated by bad press, I would not have gotten anywhere in life.”
The MoD says there are “robust processes in place.” Palantir hired four Ministry of Defence officials in 2025 alone.
These processes seem to be working exactly as designed.
They’re NOT designed to protect Britain.