{"id":348,"date":"2026-05-22T10:07:00","date_gmt":"2026-05-22T10:07:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/propertyrelocationusa.com\/?p=348"},"modified":"2026-05-22T10:07:00","modified_gmt":"2026-05-22T10:07:00","slug":"outrage-as-trump-cronies-buy-ice-warehouses-for-10x-markup-a-new-level-of-corruption","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/propertyrelocationusa.com\/?p=348","title":{"rendered":"Outrage as Trump cronies buy ICE warehouses for 10x markup: ‘A new level of corruption’"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

In what More Perfect Union described as a \u201cnew level of corruption\u201d for the Trump administration, an investigation by the progressive news outlet revealed how members of the president\u2019s inner circle are cashing in on the Department of Homeland Security\u2019s purchase of warehouses for immigrant detention.<\/p>\n

Read more This man is the antidote to Trump\u2019s poison<\/a><\/p>\n

It was reported earlier this year that under then-Secretary Kristi Noem, who has since been fired, DHS was planning to spend nearly $40 billion to buy up dozens of warehouses around the US to convert them into makeshift detention camps that could each hold anywhere from 1,000 to 10,000 people arrested as part of President Donald Trump\u2019s mass deportation effort.<\/p>\n

But when Mae Ryan, a reporter at More Perfect Union, looked into the contracts, she said she \u201cnoticed something weird.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cMany of these warehouses had been sitting on the market for years,\u201d she explained in a video posted Wednesday. \u201cNow DHS was buying them at a massive markup.\u201d<\/p>\n

She pointed to one warehouse in Socorro, Texas, recently valued at $11 million, which Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) purchased from the company El Paso Logistics II LLC for $123 million\u2014more than a 1,000% profit.<\/p>\n

According to Michael Wriston, an ex-military analyst and investigative journalist who tracked the enormous markups for several of these warehouse purchases for his website Project Salt Box back in March, \u201cacross more than a dozen warehouse acquisitions, ICE paid prices that exceeded both prior property valuations and recent market comparables at nearly every site.\u201d<\/p>\n

For one warehouse in Surprise, Arizona, previously valued at just under $12 million, ICE paid over $70 million. For another in Social Circle, Georgia, valued at about $30 million, the agency paid nearly $130 million.<\/p>\n

Many of the warehouses that raked in obscene taxpayer-funded purchases by DHS were owned by financial institutions with deep connections to the Trump administration, Ryan explained.<\/p>\n

One warehouse in Roxbury, New Jersey, valued at about $54.6 million in 2025, inexplicably sold to ICE for over $129 million, more than double. Its majority owner was the investment bank Goldman Sachs, where many Trump appointees during his first term\u2014including former Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin and Trump financial adviser Gary Cohn\u2014were formerly employed.<\/p>\n

ICE paid double for another warehouse in Tremont, Pennsylvania, buying it for nearly $120 million despite a valuation of about $60 million. It was owned by the private capital firm Blue Owl, where at least 33 members of Trump\u2019s administration have investments in its funds, including the president himself, who has about $5 million invested in the firm.<\/p>\n

Another in Salt Lake City, valued at just $97 million, was purchased by ICE for $145 million, and the agency now plans to convert it into a 10,000-bed facility. It was owned by Deutsche Bank, which has loaned Trump about $2.5 billion over the past two decades.<\/p>\n

Read more MAGA lawmaker spews conspiracy theories when pressed on Trump slush fund<\/a><\/p>\n

Wriston told More Perfect Union that the financial payout to Trump allies was top of mind for DHS as it drew up the controversial warehouse plan.<\/p>\n

\u201cICE doesn\u2019t necessarily want to be using warehouses,\u201d he said. \u201cThe plan came from folks very close to the White House who were sitting on properties that were causing them losses every year. And the decision was made to buy them at taxpayer expense.\u201d<\/p>\n

It\u2019s part of a larger pattern of ICE contracts being distributed to companies that have given major financial support to Trump.<\/p>\n

According to an investigation in March by OpenSecrets, the GEO Group and CoreCivic, two private prison companies that have collectively received more than $2.8 billion in ICE contracts, each donated $500,000 to Trump\u2019s inaugural committee. The GEO Group\u2019s employee-funded political action committee contributed $1 million to the pro-Trump super PAC Make America Great Again, Inc. during his reelection campaign in 2024.<\/p>\n

The vast majority of those who have been detained during Trump\u2019s second term have had no criminal records, despite claims by the administration that they are targeting \u201cthe worst of the worst\u201d criminals for deportation.<\/p>\n

Those who have been held in ICE detention centers\u2014often without any due process or access to a lawyer\u2014have consistently reported being held in horrendous conditions, denied access to basic food, sanitation, and medical care, and subject to torture and sexual assault by guards.<\/p>\n

DHS has reportedly spent only about $1 billion of the more than $38 billion allotted for immigration detention warehouses so far. According to The New York Times, the administration is hoping to build a mass detention system that could stuff these warehouses with over 100,000 detainees at a time across more than 20 facilities.<\/p>\n

According to Wriston\u2019s running tracker of ICE warehouse sales, at least 13 purchases have been canceled, in many cases due to public backlash. Still, the administration has already purchased enough warehouse space to hold more than 41,500 people at once.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat we\u2019re seeing happen now\u2014I never in a million years envisioned seeing this happen on US soil,\u201d Wriston said. \u201cNever. Never once.\u201d<\/p>\n

Read more They\u2019re called \u2018super pollutants\u2019 \u2014 and Trump\u2019s EPA wants to expose you to more of them<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In what More Perfect Union described as a \u201cnew level of corruption\u201d for the Trump administration, an investigation by the progressive news outlet revealed how members of the president\u2019s inner circle are cashing in on the Department of Homeland Security\u2019s purchase of warehouses for immigrant detentio…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":347,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-348","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"yoast_head":"\nOutrage as Trump cronies buy ICE warehouses for 10x markup: 'A new level of corruption' - Property Relocation USA<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/propertyrelocationusa.com\/?p=348\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Outrage as Trump cronies buy ICE warehouses for 10x markup: 'A new level of corruption' - 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