by: Chris Tomer, This is a sponsored segment by Harding and Associates PC

Posted: Jul 31, 2023 / 02:03 PM MDT

Updated: Jul 31, 2023 / 02:03 PM MDT

This is a sponsored segment by Harding and Associates PC.

Colorado’s best attorney Phil Harding stopped by GDC to discuss Colorado’s legal system and how it’s setup. Phil talks about Small Claims Court, Appeals, and more!

A mysterious company that bought more than 50,000 acres of land around an Air Force base in California for $800million is now suing farmers for conspiring to sell it at inflated prices.

Public records show 'Flannery Associates' has invested more than $800million on around 55,000 acres of land surrounding the Travis Air Force base since 2018. 

Flannery is now suing local farming families for $510million, accusing them of 'acting in flagrant disregard of federal and state law' by conspiring to inflate the value of the land it sold them.

Travis Air Force base, northeast of San Francisco, is a strategically significant base that serves as a 'gateway' to the Pacific Ocean. It houses large transport aircraft used for refueling smaller planes and sending aid and munitions around the world. 

But Rep. John Garamendi, D-Calif. now claims that lawsuit is in fact part of a scheme to bankrupt the farmers and has a 'deep suspicion' the chunks of land are being bought by a group linked to China.

In its initial complaint Flannery claims it has 'smoking gun' evidence, including text messages and emails between sellers that reveal they were illegally colluding to sell the farmland for a 'substantial premium to fair market values'.

Garamendi told NewsNation he has spoken with the families who sold their land to Flannery who claim they didn't want to sell in the first place.

He also said that there was nothing obligating Flannery to pay what it now claims is more than market value for the land. 

While he said that although there was no direct evidence Flannery is linked to China there were 'deep suspicions'.

An attorney representing Flannery has said the group is controlled by US citizens and that 97 percent of its capital comes from American investors - with the remaining investments coming from British and Irish citizens.

Nonetheless, after eight months of investigation the Air Force's 'Foreign Investment Risk Review Office' is yet to identify even one person that is part of the group.

'The fact they chose to buy all three sides of the Travis Air Force Base even raises immediate questions about national security,' Garamendi told NewsNation.

'So, is this Chinese money? We don't know, but we do know that the Chinese money was being used in North Dakota and we have a very deep suspicion, given the amount of money, given the lack of attention to values, that they simply want to acquire all of this land,' he added.

In its lawsuit, filed in the Eastern District Court of California, Flannery names a number of individuals it accused of being involved in the scheme.

Among them was Thomas McCormack, a director of the Bank of Rio Vista, which was founded and run by his family, according to SFGate.

He sold his approximately 2,500 acres to Flannery on December 18, 2019 for $20,876,500, or about $8,400 per acre, according to the lawsuit.

'It's a suit designed to force the farmers to lawyer up, spend tens of thousands of dollars on lawyering and maybe at the end of the day, bankrupt themselves,' Garamendi told News Nation.

'In fact, that has happened to at least one family that I know of and I've heard rumors that another family simply said we can't afford the lawyers.

'Travis Air Force Base is absolutely essential. It is the gateway to the Pacific,' Garamendi said.

'A good deal of the munitions that are going to Ukraine also passed through Travis Air Force Base.' 

In a letter to Solano County, the majority of which is owned by Flannery, the company described itself as being 'owned by a group of families looking to diversify their portfolio from equities into real assets, including agricultural land in the western United States,' according to county newspaper the Daily Republic.

The US Agriculture Department has made its own inquiries into who is behind Flannery but is reportedly yet to yield any results.

'Nobody can figure out who they are,' Ronald Kott, mayor of nearby Rio Vista, which is now largely surrounded by Flannery land, told The Wall Street Journal. 'Whatever they're doing - this looks like a very long-term play.'

Over the years that Flannery, registered in Delaware, has been buying up land, it has given a variety of accounts and indications as to what it wants to do with it.

An attorney for Flannery, Richard Melnyk, said in an email to the county in 2019 that it was considering working with local farmers to farm 'new types of crops or orchards,' according to The Journal.

Melnyk is referred to by name in the 'smoking gun' correspondence submitted to the court, which appears to show land owners private discussing the Flannery acquisitions. 

'Melynk [sic] is bullying the last of the property owners,' reads one of the messages. 'I think we should have a meeting in the next two weeks to talk about Flannery.'

Mitch Mashburn, who works for the county, cast doubt on the viability of using the land for agricultural purposes.

'The majority of the land they're purchasing is dry farmland,' he told The Journal. 'I don't see where that land can turn a profit to make it worth almost a billion dollars in investment.'

In a separate email also seen by the newspaper, Melnyk said Flannery was considering leasing 'a substantial portion' of its land to olive growers, including some by the base.

According to online business records, an individual called Thomas Mather was listed as once being a director or officer for the company, though there is almost no other publicly available information on him.

He is also listed as the manager of another Delaware-registered company called Diversified Land LLC, with the same California address in Folsom.

The mystery around Flannery is reminiscent of the much smaller purchase last year of 300 acres of farmland in North Dakota just minutes from another Air Force base.

The China-based food producer, Fufeng Group, planned to build a corn-milling plant on its new land in Grand Forks, just 20 minutes from the Grand Forks Air Force Base, where some of the nation's most sensitive drone technology is housed.

The purchase raised suspicions from military officers, national security experts and lawmakers alike.

A 2019 report from the US Department of Agriculture showed China owned at least 192,000 acres of US agricultural land worth over $1.9billion.

Though Canada, for example, owns far more US agricultural land, a 2018 USDA report showed China's agricultural holdings in the US and other counties had increased tenfold since 2009.

A former business partner of Hunter Biden testified that the president's son used the Biden "brand" to his advantage while working for Ukrainian energy company Burisma, according to lawmakers who were present during Monday's closed-door questioning.

Devon Archer, 49, answered questions for about four hours during a transcribed interview before the Republican-led House Oversight Committee, at one point telling members that Biden put his father on speakerphone during business meetings about 20 times, but not to talk to business, lawmakers said.

“The witness indicated that Hunter spoke to his father every day, and approximately 20 times over the course of 10-year relationship, Hunter may have put his father on the phone with any number of different people, and they never once spoke about any business dealings,” Rep. Dan Goldman, D-N.Y., told reporters after the closed-door meeting. He said that included times when Hunter Biden was with friends, and times when he was with "potential business partners or business partners.” 

“As he described it, it was all casual conversation, niceties, the weather, what’s going on. There wasn’t a single conversation about any of the business dealings that Hunter had,” Goldman added.

The committee’s chair, Rep. James Comer, R-Ky., said Archer testified that Joe Biden "joined Hunter Biden’s dinners with his foreign business associates in person or by speakerphone over 20 times" and was put on the phone to sell “the brand.”

Comer said the testimony shows “Joe Biden lied to the American people when he said he had no knowledge about his son’s business dealings and was not involved. Joe Biden was ‘the brand’ that his son sold around the world to enrich the Biden family.”

Goldman said Archer at one point testified that the “brand” he was referring to was "Hunter’s own experience as a lobbyist and a lawyer in Washington, D.C. combined with the Biden name, which is of course no different than the Trump name or the Clinton name or any other big political family name.” 

The committee has been investigating foreign payments to members of the Biden family during and after his time as vice president in the Obama administration. Republican lawmakers have alleged that Biden was involved in his son's business dealings, which the White House has denied.

Goldman said Archer "stated unequivocally" that "there is no evidence in his possession or his knowledge that Joe Biden ever discussed business with Hunter Biden, Joe Biden ever did anything on behalf of Hunter Biden’s business interests or otherwise, never changed official policy in any way, shape or form."

He also said that Archer told the panel that Biden felt he had to deliver his employers "the illusion of access to his father."

Rep. Andy Biggs, R-Ariz., said Archer told the panel he didn't know anything about an alleged $5 million bribe to the family that a Burisma executive had mentioned to an FBI informant.

Biggs, however, said he still believes the president is compromised and told reporters, "I think we should do an impeachment inquiry."

Goldman called Biggs' assertion that Biden is compromised "completely absurd."

"The witness repeated over and over and over again that President Biden never discussed any business dealings of Hunter’s with Hunter or anyone else. He repeated over and over again that he never did anything in consideration, official policy or otherwise, in consideration of whatever Hunter’s business interests were. So I have a lot of respect for Congressman Biggs, but that’s just a flat out lie."

Attorneys for Hunter Biden have not commented on Archer's testimony.

Ian Sams, a spokesperson for the White House counsel’s office, said in a statement that “House Republicans’ own much-hyped witness today testified that he never heard of President Biden discussing business with his son or his son’s associates, or doing anything wrong. House Republicans keep promising bombshell evidence to support their ridiculous attacks against the President, but time after time, they keep failing to produce any. In fact, even their own witnesses appear to be debunking their allegations.”

Archer was convicted of securities fraud and conspiracy involving a different company in June of 2018. A New York federal court judge sentenced him to a year and a day in prison last year, but stayed the sentence pending an appeal. The federal appeals court denied his bid last week.

Federal prosecutors who brought the case recently asked the judge overseeing the case to set a sentencing date, prompting some conservatives to claim that the Justice Department was trying to intimidate Archer ahead of Monday's congressional testimony.

The same prosecutors, in a court filing Sunday night, said: "To be clear, the Government does not request (and has never requested) that the defendant surrender before his Congressional testimony.”