The project changed form, but the extraction did not end. It evolved and continued—with ever-increasing imbalance between benefits and costs.
Wealth Extraction
Foxconn, the Ongoing Extraction Engine: Who Wins, Who Pays
Who Wins, Who Pays follows the money.
Foxconn: Building the Deal
From “Eighth Wonder” to AI Megasite
In July 2017, the Trump White House staged a celebration announcing that Foxconn would build a $10 billion LCD manufacturing complex in Mount Pleasant, Wisconsin, promising up to 13,000 jobs and hailing it as the “Eighth Wonder of the World.”1
State and local governments lined up nearly $3 billion in state tax credits and hundreds of millions more in local subsidies and infrastructure to make it happen.2
The site looks very different today.
The Buffalo Billion Boondoggle
Buffalo’s $959 Million Solar Factory: A Case Study in Wealth Extraction
Introduction
New York State poured $959 million into a solar-panel manufacturing plant in Buffalo, promoted as the cornerstone of the state’s Buffalo Billion and a model for high-tech economic renewal. The project was meant to create thousands of advanced-manufacturing jobs, attract new industry to western New York, and demonstrate how public investment could drive a clean-energy future.
Katie Hobbs and the Fight to Keep Arizona a Democracy
Arizona stands at a political crossroads. In 2026, voters will decide whether to preserve a balanced state government or hand unchecked power to a single party. Governor Katie Hobbs, the incumbent Democrat, is the last structural counterweight in a system where Republicans already dominate both chambers of the legislature and most statewide offices. Her veto pen has become the only thing preventing Arizona from sliding into one-party rule: a condition that would make state government functionally indistinguishable from those that have been remade under Trump-aligned control elsewhere.
This is a struggle over the survival of Arizona’s democratic architecture—the citizen-led systems that were designed to protect voters from partisan overreach. It is about preserving democracy in Arizona.
Contents: The Long Project of Consolidation → Redistricting Reforms → Citizen-Initiated Democracy → Hobbs’ Record → The Money Behind the Push → It Matters
The Homeland Security Gold Rush: $165 Billion in “Emergency” Funding
In July 2025, Congress passed what President Trump called the “One Big Beautiful Bill,” allocating an unprecedented $165 billion over the next decade to the Department of Homeland Security.[1] The massive funding surge, justified as essential for border security and national defense, has triggered what industry observers describe as a contractor “gold rush”—with companies flooding DHS agencies with proposals while normal competitive bidding processes are bypassed in the name of urgency.
Seven months into this spending spree, a clear pattern has emerged:
Prescott Water Deals Extract Wealth from Residents
A case study in public-private partnerships that transfer community resources to private developers while forcing existing residents to subsidize the arrangement.
Corpus Christi: Successful Defense Against Corporate Extraction
After a decade of community organizing, Corpus Christi City Council rejected a massive desalination plant that would have forced residents to subsidize industrial water supply while facing drought restrictions themselves. The September 4, 2025 decision came after a contentious 13-hour meeting with multiple arrests, ending a project whose cost estimates had exploded from $160 million in 2019 to $1.2 billion.
The Great Transfer: American Government as a Wealth Extraction Machine
The 2025 Administration represents a brand new level of fraud and corruption. While the American government has always faced influence and capture by private interests, the 2025 administration appears to represent the most extensive and systematic version in modern history. We are witnessing the systematic transfer of all public assets—taxpayer money, public assets, government services, and democratic institutions—into the hands of selected politicians, the top 1%, and corporate special interests. This is government capture on an unprecedented scale.
My President, The Mob Boss
The US now threatens democratic allies with economic destruction unless they pay tribute – classic mob boss behavior exported globally.