43 Comments
User's avatar
MJ Delaney's avatar

What about the issue of DHS paying up to 3 or 4 times the ssessed value of the warehouses they bought? There's a massive grift and fraud there and I'll bet the ranch some familiar Trump Admin names and faces walked off with some significant benefits and/or enrichment from all alleged that corruption - and all our money.

Jason O'Toole's avatar

And buying warehouses at inflated prices from Russian oligarchs that lack sufficient utilities and local government support.

Donna Smith's avatar

The grift is obvious.

William Darian Boggs's avatar

I doubt the government will ever be able to sell the properties at their original assessed values. 1. Buyers know the government is under pressure to sell them. 2. No other buyer will value the "redevelopment" by the government.

No matter how much money the government spends on the warehouses, there will never be a "point of no return". The "sunk cost" fallacy is never valid. The sooner we cut our losses, the better off we are. That 2x to 3x excess is gone already.

Sonia Shah's avatar

Yes now is the time to make noise! The hearing for the Maryland AG's lawsuit against the proposed ICE camp outside Hagerstown is on Wed April 15 at 10 am at the Federal Court House on Lombard street in Baltimore. Folks from the ACLU, CASA and the Maryland Coalition to Stop the Camps among others will be rallying at the courthouse

Sarah's avatar

I cannot thank you enough for all the painstaking research and reporting on this subject- Our senators and congressmen need to be reading Project Salt Box! How would we know what's going on without this information. As we know Democracy dies in Darkness

Ilana Wallach's avatar

Thank you for your superb reporting, as usual. I'll spread the word for people to make noise. We can't let them do this by stealth.

Dr. David Black's avatar

impech him with a subpoena

jab's avatar

One and all, keep up the pressure, it's clearly working. Thank you for all you're doing to inform the public.

S Rea's avatar

Southwestern states, where at least one big warehouse was secretly purchased WITHOUT CONSIDERATION or CONSULTATION with state officials or the people who will live nearby (seriously bad to ask our tax money to slap us in the face with), are also facing existential water shortages and limits its use. But who, up there in the White House, would know that? They are too, too busy getting filthy rich off ........ you know if you read this far.

BAE's avatar

Do not be fooled, they are cooling their jets or going underground doing things in secret for the midterms ….

karemm's avatar

Tell me when to be there to protest!

Sonia Shah's avatar

the hearing is at 10 am. there may also be a 9 am rally. stay tuned...!

Muddymiss's avatar

THIS is good news. Like a drop of rain during a drought of good news.

This warehouse question horrifies me.

Dr. David Black's avatar

dum the miller nazi scum

Carol Loy's avatar

Sounds like a good win to me. Project Salt Box - keep up what you're doing. And to DHS -Keep infighting y'all! Poor s. miller - he needs to find a hole to crawl into. What an embarrassment he is.

TRADE CRAFTERS's avatar

There’s something revealing about a project that keeps moving forward even as the people tasked with running it quietly resist.

It starts to feel less like a machine designed to work, and more like a set piece that has to be built regardless of whether it functions. The effort shifts from execution to insistence.

You can picture it like scaffolding going up around a structure no one fully believes in—workers tightening bolts, supervisors arguing over blueprints, all while the foundation underneath is still being questioned.

And in moments like that, what matters isn’t whether it can be built. It’s whether anyone actually wants to stand inside it once it’s done.

Kay Pealstrom's avatar

Curious here. If Trump wants MASS DEPORTATION, so what use is the reason to purchase warehouses in every state? Doesn’t ‘deport’ mean ‘to take away?’

So why buy warehouses? Just sayin’!!!

William Darian Boggs's avatar

In addition to the real specter that the warehouses are for us, I think this is about money. The administration is paying their cronies to buy, retrofit, and run these concentration camps. I think the administration wants to keep the camps filled to capacity to keep funneling money to their cronies. So deporting all of the detainees is not important.

Robert's avatar

My worry is that these boxes are not just for illegal migrants it’s to house those they want to target during the midterms. That would be us.