The San Jose City Council sidestepped calls from local activists to divest from Israel-linked companies during its meeting Tuesday. Instead, the council took up a proposal to unwind investments in companies linked to immigration enforcement. That measure failed.
Before the vote, a scene unfolded in the council chambers that has become familiar in cities across the Bay Area, particularly since Oct. 7, 2023, as about 60 people rose to speak during what ordinarily would have been a routine review of the city’s investment portfolio.
The Silicon Valley branch of the Democratic Socialists of America and a group called San Jose Against War had launched a petition calling for the city to divest from five companies targeted by the boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) movement — Caterpillar, Honeywell, Amazon, Microsoft and Alphabet, the parent company of Google — that the activists said are complicit in “Israel’s genocide against Palestine.”
The petition had over 2,300 signatures as of Wednesday.
San Jose does not hold stocks in individual companies, but corporate bonds.
Pro-Palestinian activists, some wearing kaffiyehs and holding signs, came to the meeting to implore the council to divest from the companies because of their ties to Israel. They also pointed to contracts with the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement amid the federal agency’s immigration crackdown, naming Amazon, Microsoft and Alphabet.
On the other side of the debate, many speakers argued that such a divestment plan would harm the city’s bottom line and have little impact on national policies or geopolitics. A number of Jewish and Israeli speakers said the activists were unfairly demonizing Israel in a way that contributes to a dangerous threat environment for Jews.
“I hear people talking about justice, rights,” said a middle-age man wearing a white button-down shirt who identified himself as Venezuelan-born and said he works in San Jose. “Should San Jose divest from Mexico and China? How about the drug trafficking problem?”
Describing the divestment plan as “misguided,” “ridiculous” and “fake,” he said, “it is designed to hurt one country and one people.”
“There is nothing divisive about standing against a genocide that our tax dollars are paying for,” said a woman wearing a red T-shirt reading SURJ, an acronym for the group Showing Up for Racial Justice. “Please divest from these companies and free Palestine.”
In recent years, BDS efforts have had some success in Bay Area cities. In 2024, Hayward narrowly voted to unwind its investments in Intel, Chevron, Caterpillar and Hyundai after efforts by pro-Palestinian activists. Months later, Richmond also voted to divest from Israel-linked companies. In December 2024, Alameda County treasurer Henry Levy sold $32 million in Caterpillar bonds because of the company’s ties to the Israeli military.
But in San Jose, the story ended differently. The council chose not to consider Israel or the politics of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in its investment decisions at all.
Instead, two council members proposed that the city sunset its investments tied to Alphabet, Amazon and Microsoft because of their links to ICE. They cited a January article in Forbes, which reported that under the current presidential administration, ICE had ordered tens of millions of dollars worth of Microsoft and Amazon products and spent $530,000 on Google Cloud products.
“We’re not motioning to divest from Israel or for getting involved with foreign countries,” said Peter Ortiz, who alongside fellow council member Rosemary Kamei proposed cutting investments in ICE-linked companies.
“Companies can choose who they do business with,” Ortiz said. “When those choices involve profiting from terrorizing our residents, there should be consequences.”
The ICE proposal failed on a 4-4 vote. Opponents described the proposal as difficult to implement and potentially harmful to the city’s finances. Some council members noted that San Jose municipal employees use Microsoft technology and that the city has no plans to revisit its own million-dollar contract.
Ortiz earlier had noted that many of the speakers on the Israeli-Palestinian issue had addressed an issue that wasn’t even being considered by the council that day.
The Jewish Community Relations Council Bay Area commended the council in a statement for resisting calls to “insert international affairs into the city’s investment policy.”
“Actions that single out Israel unfairly stigmatize Jewish constituents and run counter to San José’s commitment to fostering a safe, inclusive, and vibrant community for all,” the JCRC said in a statement.