Strange Bedfellows: Texas Joins Biden Admin. in Suing Massive Illegal-Immigrant Development

AUSTIN, Texas — The State of Texas has now joined federal agencies in alleging a vast land sales fraud and foreclosure abuse scheme by the developers of perhaps the largest illegal immigrant colonia in the United States, a 60-square-mile city of at least 50,000 (and up to 75,000) northeast of Houston named Colony Ridge.

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton’s office alleges that Colony Ridge Development owners John and Trey Harris — once large Republican campaign donors to Gov. Greg Abbott — ran aggressive “predatory” land sales and “foreclosure mill” schemes that systematically defrauded tens of thousands “Spanish speakers” from “international communities” for more than a decade.

Many of the state’s allegations mirror federal ones that Biden administration-led agencies filed on December 20, 2023, in an 11-count civil rights complaint. The federal civil charges seeking payback damages allege that since at least 2016, the Harris brothers ran a large-scale “illegal land sales scheme” predicated on “predatory” and false advertising that tricked tens of thousands of Latinos into buying do-it-yourself, flooding-prone home building lots despite extremely high interest, foreclosure, and property-flipping rates.

No one knows how many illegal immigrants bought land in Colony Ridge from the Harris family. But local residents, law enforcement officials, business owners, and elected office holders almost uniformly believe the majority who bought into the massive colonia bought do-it-yourself home plots at high interest rates because they were not legally present in the United States; the company required no proof of income or credit.

While none of the lawsuits spell out that marketing and sales targeted illegal immigrants, the state filing and press release about marketing and selling to “international communities” suggest that former Colony Ridge employees are poised to later say so.

“Among other things, former employees of Colony Ridge have represented that the company instructed them to avoid selling to customers who could speak English or who did not appear to be of Latino or Hispanic heritage,” it said.

The brothers have colorfully denied all of the federal allegations, telling a local news outlet that the lawsuit was “total bullshit”, its allegations completely false.

“I don’t understand why we are being made into the bad guys,” Trey Harris said. “There are thousands of people who were living in apartments and rent houses who now have their own houses and are earning equity. If they are paying slightly higher interest rates, it is still better than paying rent and not earning equity.”

The brothers, though clearly eager to defeat the civil lawsuits and the massive business-killing penalties they portend, may soon have to expand their defense to new battlefields.

The New York Post has reported that the IRS and U.S. Army Corps of Engineers have opened investigations on Colony Ridge’s developers and operations, and The Daily Wire has reported that the Environmental Protection Agency’s Region 6 office has an active investigation, too.

https://cis.org/Bensman/Strange-Bedfellows-Texas-Joins-Biden-Admin-Suing-Massive-IllegalImmigrant-Development

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