B.C. billionaire Jim Pattison's Virginia warehouse could become ICE facility
CBC
The U.S. Department of Homeland Security is in talks to buy a Virginia warehouse owned by British Columbia billionaire Jim Pattison, with plans to turn it into an Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) processing facility.
In a Jan. 21 letter to officials in Hanover County, Va., the Department of Homeland Security shared its intent to "purchase, occupy and rehabilitate" the roughly 550,000-square-foot warehouse property, which has been owned by Jim Pattison Developments since 2022.
“As part of the undertaking, ICE may conduct exterior and interior modifications to the existing warehouse facility,” the letter said, including the “construction of holding and processing spaces.”
Pattison is a businessman and philanthropist whose conglomerate the Jim Pattison Group spans various sectors including real estate, automotive, media and retail.
The Jim Pattison Group and Jim Pattison Developments did not immediately return requests for comment.
The potential deal has sparked anger and disapproval, including from the leader of the B.C. Green Party who is now calling for a boycott of Pattison’s Save-on-Foods grocery stores.
Pattison is the latest Canadian company to face criticism over associations with ICE.
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“If I were a CEO, I wouldn't want my name or my company's name, my brand, associated with what's going on in the States right now,” said Chris MacDonald, an associate professor in the law and business department at Toronto Metropolitan University.
“There's just a plain ethical issue. There's a question of right and wrong and whether it's right for a company, or for anyone, to be contributing, even in a small way, to the activities that are going on.”
In a social media video viewed over 80,000 times on TikTok alone, B.C. Green Party leader Emily Lowan called on Pattison to sever ties with ICE and encouraged people to boycott his grocery stores.
“As we stare down what is increasingly the fascist and possible civil war unfolding in the United States, I think as Canadians we need to be crystal clear about who is driving, who's contributing to the crises we're facing and how we can step up and take real actions,” Lowan said in an interview with CBC News.
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