Liftoff at Musk's SpaceX base was fueled by wheeling-dealing Texas politicians
SpaceX, billionaire Elon Musk's space venture, to buy two brick ranch houses she owns near the mouth of the Rio Grande.
The properties are nestled amid the South Texas scrubland where SpaceX established an ever-expanding facility for the production and launch of its rockets. For decades, they've served as a home for the former social worker and a source of retirement income from beachgoers who once rented one of the houses, a short walk from the Gulf of Mexico.
SpaceX's breakneck development, and fast-changing local regulations that facilitated it, disrupted her quiet retirement and halted much of the beach traffic. It also raised her property taxes, inflated by soaring values all around her as neighbors sold land to SpaceX.
To seek relief, Johnson wrote local officials, including Alex Dominguez, a state legislator who at the time represented her district. In a 2021 email reviewed by Reuters, Dominguez replied that he was «sympathetic.» He couldn't «choose sides,» though, because it was a matter for the county government.
What Dominguez didn't tell Johnson: He, too, owned land in the area, purchased years before SpaceX's arrival. Dominguez received campaign contributions from SpaceX lobbyists. And as he voted on measures that spurred SpaceX's local development, the value of his property soared more than 180-fold.
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