Here’s Every Candidate Who Took Money From ICE’s Landlord And Data Center Tycoon, Sabey Corporation

Data center tycoon and ICE’s newest Western Washington landlord, Sabey Corporation, is backing a handful of Democrat State lawmakers in the upcoming November election: Reps. April Berg, Dan Bronoske, Jake Fey, Mari Leavitt, Alicia Rule, Amy Walen, and Sens. Marko Liias and John Lovick. 

As the Democratic Party tries to ride a wave of popular sentiment against the big, AI bro-ligarchy and Trump’s fascist deportation machine, party members who take money from a company profiteering off both may have some explaining to do.

"Sabey Corporation is a real home-grown villain," advocates from Washington AI Resistance told The Burner. "[T]he family and company support ICE and are major Trump donors, and they’re building data centers against community wishes in Washington and across the country."

Washington AI Resistance concluded: "It's dirty money, and incompatible with democracy."

Sabey Corporation became the object of local activist ire earlier this year after WIRED exposed the Department of Homeland Security’s covert plan to expand ICE’s footprint nationwide, publishing dozens of leases for new ICE office space. In the bombshell story, WIRED named Riverfront Technical Park, an office space at 2811 S. 102nd St. in Tukwila owned by Sabey Corporation. The company did not publicly confirm plans to rent office space to ICE, but later the Mayor of Tukwila said Sabey Corporation told the City to take WIRED’s reporting “at face value.”

WIRED’s reporting inspired community members to protest both outside of the facility and inside Hunts Point City Hall, where Sabey Corporation President Joseph Sabey serves as Mayor for the affluent Lake Washington enclave.

The outrage isn't surprising. After all, research shows broad concerns about the proliferation of AI and disapproval of ICE's draconian crackdown. Democrats on all levels are messaging on these issues, capitalizing on the outrage. The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee is attacking Republicans on their industry-shillery on data centers, Washington State lawmakers are expected to have canned responses to questions about regulations, and Seattle City Council members universally supported the year-long moratorium, which could help the corpo Dems look more populist in the 2027 election. Immigration has also become a major campaign theme, with State lawmakers highlighting their milquetoast efforts to stand up to ICE on their mailers.

The behavior of Sabey Corporation, a prolific donor with financial interest in both contentious issues, shows, beyond the campaign gloss, who the tech-fascist believes is doing its bidding.

For the most part, Sabey Corporation sticks to Republicans, pouring $50,000 into President Donald Trump's inaguguration committee and doling out donos to more than 40 Republican candidates for the Washington State Legislature. This includes Reps. Peter Abbarno, Hunter Abell, Andrew Barkis, Stephanie Barnard, Jonathan Bingle, Matt Boehnke, Brian Burnett, April Connors, Chris Corry, Travis Couture, Tom Dent, Jeremie Dufault, Mary Dye, Andrew Engell, Phil Fortunato, Dan Griffey, Cyndy Jacobsen, Michael Keaton, Mark Klicker, Sam Low,  Deb Manjarrez, Stephanie McClintock, Joel McEntire, Gloria Mendoza, Ed Orcutt, Joshua Penner, Skyler Rude, Joe Schmick, Suzanne Schmidt, Drew Stokesbary, David Stuebe, Jim Walsh, Kevin Waters, Alex Ybarra, Sens. Drew C MacEwen, Shelly Short, Nikki Torres, Judith Warnick, House candidates Katy Cornell,  Robert “Chili” Hicks, Isaiah Paine, and Senate candidate Erika Creydt.

The sea of red candidates makes the handful of Democrats who earned Sabey Corporation's support stand out all the more. Again: Reps. Berg, Bronoske, Fey, Leavitt, Rule, Walen, and Sens. Liias and Lovick. 

Olympia-heads will recognize many of these names as caucus conservatives, already backed by corporate interests and the real estate lobby.

But for some of these Democrats, this donation reads plainly as a “thank you” for supporting Sabey Corporation’s interest in the State Legislature last session, particularly when it comes to the proliferation of data centers. Rule, Walen, and Bronoske were among a handful of Democrats to vote against Olympia’s attempt to regulate data centers, House Bill 2515. The bill suffocated under the pressure of industry before it could get a vote in the Senate. 

Fey and Berg may still be in Sabey Corporation's good graces from past efforts to support development in 2022 when the legislature was on a pro-data center kick.

As for immigration, it doesn't look like Sabey Corporation is getting much out of the Democrats besides their inherent lack of urgency and imagination. Walen voted against the Immigrant Worker Protection Act, a common sense pro-immigrant policy requiring bosses to provide timely written notice to employees when they learn there’ll be a federal I-9 inspection and to post information about workers’ rights. 

The only Democrat to respond to request for comment, Berg, defended the donation, saying it ultimately helps bolster a Democratic supermajority and to her, her record doesn't read as "bought." After all, she also voted “yes” to regulate data centers in House Bill 2515.

That's not to say Berg's an enemy to the industry. Sabey Corporation can thank her for the 2022 bill that expanded the data center tax exemptions, for her "no recommendation" vote on HB 2515 in committee, and they can rest assured she won't be pushing any bans or moratoriums.

“Data centers are ubiquitous to everything we do in life. Period. Full stop. They are not going away,” Berg said at the National Conference of State Legislatures in Chicago.

She continued, “If somebody sends me a spicy email about data centers, I say please, please, please hand-walk that to my office because if you email me over a server about a data center and how you want it to go away — the hypocrisy speaks for itself."

Still, Berg thinks her party gets the better end of the deal with the relatively small donation to her campaign. Returning that donation for sake of purity would just mean less money she can funnel from her surplus campaign fund to the House Caucus Campaign Committee to support contested races across the state and build a supermajority in the House. In July, Berg transferred $50,000 from her surplus fund to the House Caucus Campaign Committee, according to PDC filings. 

Sabey Corporation is just one of many political donors that attempts to buy influence in Olympia, and the company is far from the biggest spender. Tech giants such as Microsoft and Amazon funnel hundreds of thousands into state and local elections to promote pro-business candidates who they believe will do their bidding in office — such as Walen! 

In all, the donations from Sabey Corporation cannot come close to fully explaining the lack of courage Democrats have displayed on the issues of data center regulation and immigrant wellbeing. Despite messaging hard on both fronts, Democrats failed to pass comprehensive regulation on data centers and their proudest achievement on the immigration front appeared to be an unenforceable mask ban, which given the fact that ICE chuds were literally killing civilians in the street, did not seem like a serious response. So, Democrats don’t have to take Sabey Corporation's blood money to qualify for pressure to do more for the people of Washington.