Maine

Workers at Maine’s illegal cannabis grow sites report signs of human trafficking

Published

2 years ago

August 12, 2024

Workers at Maine’s illegal cannabis grow sites report signs of human trafficking

A Homeland Security Investigations agent and a deputy from the Somerset County Sheriff’s Office stand on May 30 inside an illegal marijuana grow site in St. Albans. Somerset County Sheriff’s Office photo

In late December, someone claiming to be a worker at an illegal cannabis grow site in the Kennebec County town of China called the police. The caller claimed to have been brought to the rural house at 1144 Route 3 against his or her will and was being held without food or sleep in order to maintain and harvest the marijuana crop.

“No cellphones. We were abducted from China, passports were confiscated,” a transcript of the call reads. “No escape from the house, only work but no salary. I want to leave here, we tried to escape but failed. We were beaten. Please come and save us.”

Kennebec County Sheriff’s Office deputies who responded to the call found three people and nearly 1,000 mature cannabis plants inside the house. Two men, Changgeng Chen, 36, and Bing Xu, 41, and a woman, Aiqin Chen, 43, were arrested at the scene.

Officers said they found no one in distress at the house, and Kennebec County Sheriff Ken Mason would later say there was “no indication the tip was authentic.”

The U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Maine says it has found no credible evidence that there is human trafficking involved in any of the illegal grow sites the office has investigated, more than 40 of which have been raided by members of law enforcement.

“Human trafficking is a heinous crime that our office takes seriously. Any evidence of human trafficking will be thoroughly investigated and if discovered, vigorously prosecuted,” Darcie N. McElwee, U.S. attorney for the District of Maine, said in a statement in May.

Local law enforcement officials and anti-trafficking advocates said in interviews that the illegal marijuana growing operations bear the hallmarks of human and labor trafficking. In court records, some workers detained at the grow sites say the same thing, raising the prospect that workers are being brought to the locations in rural Maine under false pretenses and kept here against their will.

Officials say they have identified more than 200 illegal marijuana growing operations in Maine. Federal prosecutors say the illegal marijuana grows may be operated by transnational criminal organizations with links to China, and similar operations can be found in at least 20 states.

Because they are new immigrants to the United States in search of work, money and housing, workers are often vulnerable to being exploited by the operations, which are seeking cheap, expendable labor they can tightly control.

Human trafficking is defined as “the exploitation of a person through force, fraud or coercion for labor, services or commercial sex,” according to Hailey Virusso, director of the anti-human trafficking division of Preble Street in Portland, which provides services and seeks solutions for those experiencing a variety of issues, including homelessness, a lack of stable and affordable housing, hunger and poverty.

A raid earlier this year revealed what officials say was an illegal cannabis growing operation at a single-family house at 368 West Ridge Road in Cornville, top. The lower photo, taken by the Somerset County Sheriff’s Office, shows the house’s interior.

It is an umbrella term that includes a number of other crimes, including labor exploitation and trafficking, Virusso says. Advocates say all three are likely occurring at Maine’s illegal cannabis grow houses.

Traffickers specifically target Chinese immigrants with promises of good work and steady pay, taking advantage of new immigrants’ trust in the communities they have traveled thousands of miles to join.

Among the grow house workers arrested in Maine, all with Chinese backgrounds, many have given home addresses in Massachusetts, New York, Florida or California, with several coming from the Brooklyn borough of New York City.

Officials say some workers are aware they are growing illegal cannabis, while others are misled and brought to the grow sites through more dubious means.

On numerous Chinese-language job boards, dozens of veiled job listings appear for grow houses in Maine. They are presented as openings for “four-season indoor crop planting,” courier drivers, energy company apprentices and other jobs.

Many of the listings describe themselves as plant harvesting or processing facilities, but none discloses what it is growing. Some present themselves as entry-level jobs with warehouses or electric companies that offer free training and room for growth.

Most require basic legal documents, such as a driver’s license and tax filings. Nearly all offer free accommodation and transportation, which experts say are hallmarks of human trafficking operations.

The same contact information appears on nearly a dozen job listings across several Chinese-language job boards, offering roles ranging from “watering and cleaning potted plant debris” to “warehouse workers with legal jobs and basic English reading and writing.”

A reverse search for the Maine telephone number listed on nearly a dozen job listings across several websites does not return results. Many other listings direct applicants to anonymous recruiters on WeChat, a Chinese messaging platform.

Offering free housing and requiring tax documents allows criminal organizations that operate grow houses to scoop up low-income immigrants who largely come legally to the United States from China, according to officials.

Misleading online job listings have rapidly become the primary avenue for human traffickers to recruit workers across all fields. According to data from the National Human Trafficking Hotline, 67% of victims of labor trafficking were recruited through what appeared to be a legitimate job offer in 2021, the most recent year for which data is available.

Human traffickers often take advantage of people’s individual needs and trust in their communities to coerce them into forced labor, according to Rafael Flores Ávalos, director of bilingual communications at the Polaris Project, which operates the National Human Trafficking Hotline.

Ávalos says those with lower incomes and a lack of stable housing are most susceptible to forced labor.

“There’s a big myth that if you’re going to be trafficked, you’re going to get kidnapped in a white van. That is not the case,” he said. “What we hear more of from the hotline is of the recruitment process, of people attracted to these opportunities by someone they trust.”

Aside from their Chinese descent, many of the grow house workers have little else in common. Some are men, some are women. Some are elderly, some are in their early 20s. Some have received education, others have not.

INSIDE THE HOMES

Once workers are brought to Maine, they are put to work planting, watering and harvesting hundreds of cannabis plants each day inside single-family homes that have been gutted and converted into massive marijuana farms growing as many as 2,000 plants at a time, according to several sources in law enforcement.

At the grow houses that have busted in Maine, workers have been kept in squalor and are rarely allowed to leave the sites, according to several law enforcement sources who have been present for the raids. The living space for as many as three or four workers is confined to one room at each house, oftentimes the kitchen, while industrial-scale heating, lighting and ventilation systems are installed at the houses to accommodate the growth of thousands of marijuana plants.

As a result of the high humidity and warm temperatures needed to efficiently grow marijuana, the houses are often filled with black mold. Potent and sometimes carcinogenic chemical fertilizers are used inside the houses.

While laborers were previously living and working for months at a time within each individual cannabis grow house, the operations have adapted since the first police raids in January by further restricting workers’ movement, according to several law enforcement sources.

Police who raided a home in Madison in April say they found evidence of an illegal marijuana growing operation and signs of black mold. Somerset County Sheriff’s Office photo

Somerset County Sheriff Dale Lancaster, whose office has busted more than 20 grow houses, says the number of sites and the amount of people staffing them has shrunk in the months since the first busts earlier this year, partly due to a shift in how the workers are managed.

“We are executing these search warrants, but there’s no one at the residence, and I think that’s by design,” Lancaster said. “We’re dealing with smart people, and they’re adjusting how they do business.”

Laborers are increasingly being transported by their managers from house to house, diligently watched as they harvest and process each site’s cannabis crop for several hours, before being brought to the next location, according to several law enforcement sources.

Nearly all have their movements restricted to and from the cannabis grow houses by managers overseeing the movement of the fertilizers, electrical equipment and people required to operate the facilities. The organizational structure beyond that remains murky.

Federal and local investigators say they are seeing fewer lower-level workers living within a single grow house, with more laborers being taken from one site to another — trends indicative of labor trafficking.

“They’re being dispatched to work in these places, where they were originally staying in these places, sometimes in vans or cars,” one law enforcement source said on the condition of anonymity because the source was not authorized to speak publicly about the investigation.

Restricting transportation is one of the most restrictive ways control their victims, Virusso said, especially when workers are brought to remote areas where they have not been before.

“If you’re faced with a situation where your employer says, ‘You’re done for the day, but my buddy down the road needs some extra help,’” Virusso said, “you have basically only two options: Go work at the other location, or say no to the person your employment, housing and livelihood is tied up into.”

KEPT IN THE DARK

At one Somerset County marijuana grow site, workers did not know the names of the towns where they were being sent to work and sleep. This was not because they did not know English, but because their bosses never let them see the outside world, according to Lancaster.

“Speaking with them, one of the males didn’t even know what town he was in or what town he was staying in,” Lancaster said. The man only knew “that he got picked up in the morning, taken to a facility to work and taken back.”

In court documents and police affidavits, several people arrested at the cannabis grow houses have described being brought to the sites against their will and having their pay withheld after they arrived.

A worker at a growing operation in Whitefield told police he had “been working for a few years,” but never received a paycheck. When arrested in January, the man, Ding Zhan Liao, said he had less than $500 despite having grown illegal marijuana for years.

Federal investigators say each cannabis grow house is run differently, and some laborers receive payment based on the amount of marijuana they harvest and process.

“Typically, workers on the ground are earning at least several thousand dollars (monthly),” Andrew Lizotte, the assistant U.S. attorney who is leading the federal investigation into the illegal cannabis grow houses, said. “It’s an agreed-upon labor structure where they are acting in exchange for payment to staff up these illegal operations.”

Still, many of those arrested at the cannabis grow are unaware that what they are doing is illegal, according to several sources, because they are new to the United States, unfamiliar with cannabis laws and sometimes being told lies by their bosses.

Some workers are told by their bosses that what they are doing is legal under Maine’s marijuana laws, according to a law enforcement source who asked not to be named because the source has not been cleared to discuss the investigation publicly.

The Lincoln County Sheriff’s Office in January raided 615 Wiscasset Road in Whitefield, where officials say they found 300 marijuana plants that were part of an illegal grow operation. Joe Phelan/Kennebec Journal file

“Some of them don’t know that what they’re doing is illegal because they just have been told (marijuana) is legal in Maine,” the source said. “Some of the houses even have fake (marijuana growing) licenses they can point to and say, ‘See, we’re not breaking the law.’”

The fact that workers are being forcibly kept at and trafficked between marijuana grow houses is indicative of forced criminality, Virusso said, regardless of how much they know about Maine cannabis law.

“Forced criminality is a form of labor trafficking that is oftentimes deeply invisible,” Virusso said. “(It) is when someone’s trafficking experience required or compelled them to engage in illicit or criminalized activity. That could be selling drugs, if somebody’s forcing them to engage in that.”

Federal investigators maintain that their investigations have found no evidence of human or labor trafficking within the cannabis grow houses, though Lizotte noted that nearly identical operations in nearly a dozen other states have employed forms of human trafficking.

“It’s been reported that different states and different regions have disparate dynamics; for example, Oklahoma, the Pacific Northwest, California,” Lizotte said. “But here in Maine, we haven’t seen evidence to suggest that there is human or labor trafficking. The U.S. attorney’s views on that remain unchanged.”

Local law enforcement and anti-trafficking advocates dispute that assertion, noting that the cannabis grows are cloaked in layers of secrecy.

“Illicit marijuana grows are rife with the potential for exploitative conditions because they create layers of invisibility, which creates real fear and justifiable fear,” Virusso said. “Just because we don’t see something doesn’t mean it’s not there.”

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Maine

A top issue in Maine and Oklahoma governors’ races? Tribal sovereignty. – ICT

Published

8 hours ago

May 14, 2026

Press Room

A top issue in Maine and Oklahoma governors’ races? Tribal sovereignty. – ICT

This story is part one of a two-part story on gubernatorial races to watch in the 2026 midterm elections as part of the #NativeVote26.

Pauly Denetclaw
ICT

Two of the 39 states with gubernatorial races have tribal sovereignty at the top of their policy agendas: Oklahoma and Maine. The two states where tribal nations have had friction with their state governments. Now Native voters in both states will be electing a new governor, and the results will impact the relationship between tribal governments and the state for the next four years.

Wabanaki Nations in Maine had a challenging time getting state legislation signed into law by Gov. Janet Mills, Democrat, that would strengthen tribal sovereignty. The 38 tribes in Oklahoma had a tumultuous relationship with Republican Gov. Kevin Stitt.

Eighteen of the 39 governor races in 2026 will have incumbent candidates, according to the National Governors Association. Stitt is the 2025-2026 chair of the association.

What’s happening in Oklahoma?

Over the past seven years, tribal nations and the state of Oklahoma had a contentious relationship — especially after the McGirt decision. Current governor, Stitt, who is a Cherokee Nation citizen, has been outspoken against the McGirt decision, tribal compacts for tobacco and car tags, and tribal gaming compacts.

Tribal-state compacts are legal agreements between federally recognized tribes and state governments. It is most commonly used for class III gaming — slot machines and table games.

“There was a time and a day when we used to compact with the tribes. That is not a unique thing across the nation. It wasn’t a unique thing in Oklahoma,” Chip Keating said during an April 6 candidates forum. “We absolutely have to hit the full reset button with the tribes — work together, treat them with the respect that they should have been treated with, and we’ve got to get back to compacting.”

Tribal leaders are looking forward to new state leadership, said Michael Stopp, president and chief executive officer of SevenStar Holdings.

“It’s good for the tribes and the tribal leaders are happy about it,” said Stopp, a citizen of the Cherokee Nation. “It has very much been a sticking point with tribal leaders that Governor Stitt has a very different perspective on sovereignty and what role the tribes play in this state. Obviously, we’ve had some big changes with the reservation status here because of the McGirt decision in 2020, but Governor Stitt, who is a member of the Cherokee Nation, has been more of an antagonist when it comes to that, than trying to help with the transition. I can definitely say the tribal leaders are looking for leadership change.”

Cherokee Nation Principal Chief Chuck Hoskin called Stitt the most anti-Indian governor in the state’s history. Oklahoma Attorney General Gentner Drummond described Stitt as having a “penchant of racism against tribes,” during an April candidates forum. He added that it was unacceptable.

Oklahoma Gov. Kevin Stitt is pictured during an interview in his office Wednesday, Aug. 3, 2022, in Oklahoma City. The Oklahoma Board of Pardon and Parole has recommended clemency for death row inmate James Coddington. Stitt said that he hasn’t been formally briefed on Coddington’s case, but that with any clemency recommendation, he meets with prosecutors, defense attorneys and the victim’s family before making a decision. (AP Photo, Sue Ogrocki) Credit: Oklahoma Gov. Kevin Stitt is pictured during an interview in his office Wednesday, Aug. 3, 2022, in Oklahoma City. The Oklahoma Board of Pardon and Parole has recommended clemency for death row inmate James Coddington. Stitt said that he hasn’t been formally briefed on Coddington’s case, but that with any clemency recommendation, he meets with prosecutors, defense attorneys and the victim’s family before making a decision. (AP Photo, Sue Ogrocki)

Tribal nations and state governments have to work together often. As seen in Oklahoma, Stitt vetoed several tribal compacts, despite overwhelming support by the state’s legislature, and this slowed the process for establishing the tobacco, car tag and gaming compacts between Oklahoma and tribal nations.

“Governor Stitt came in thinking that he could renegotiate this contract, and quite frankly, it just doesn’t work that way. Instead of listening and coming to the negotiating table, (Stitt) tried to come in with a really strong stance and ended up losing, honestly,” Stopp said. “I think that was unfortunate for him and for the tribes. Again, missing out on the chance of negotiating and I think the tribal leaders are definitely looking forward to having someone on the other side of the table to negotiate with.”

Oklahoma governor candidates

There are nine Republican candidates on the ballot for Oklahoma’s primary election set for June 16:

Gentner Drummond: 20th Attorney General for Oklahoma
Chip Keating: Former highway trooper and former Oklahoma Secretary of Public Safety
Mike Mazzei: Former Oklahoma state Senator and former Secretary of Budget
Charles McCall: Longest-serving Speaker of the House in Oklahoma history
Jake Merrick: Local radio host and former Oklahoma state Senator
Kenneth Sturgell: Local, small business owner
Leisa Mitchell Haynes: Former marketing director and former city manager
Calup Anthony Taylor
Jennifer Domenico-Tillett

Three Democratic gubernatorial candidates are also running for the primary election:

Cyndi Munson: Oklahoma House Minority leader
Connie Johnson: Former Oklahoma state Senator
Arya

Candidates will have to get more than 50 percent of the votes to avoid a runoff. If there is no outright winner, the top two candidates for each political party will head to a primary runoff election on August 25.

An additional three Independent candidates will automatically head to the general election this November.

Two important issues this election in Oklahoma are tribal sovereignty and a commitment to working with tribes.

During an April 6 Republican candidates forum, Gentner Drummond, Charles McCall, Chip Keating and Mike Mazzei, were asked to raise their hand if they shared Stitt’s perspective on the McGirt decision. Stitt was quoted as saying that the McGirt decision has torn Oklahoma apart and has created two justice systems based on race. None of the four candidates raised their hand.

“For three and a half years I’ve been working with every tribal leader in the state of Oklahoma, and I recognize them as unique among themselves, just like France is different from Germany,” Oklahoma Attorney General Gentner Drummond said during a candidates forum. “We have to honor and respect the culture of diversity that they bring to the table and the needs that they have. We have been working with tribal law enforcement each of the last three years to take the fight to organize crime in our rural communities. They are a great partner.”

All four candidates promised their administration would work with tribal nations and negotiate tribal compacts.

Mazzei said at two different candidate forums that he would be a strong negotiator with tribal nations.

In a recent interview with KOCO 5 News, local small business owner Kenneth Sturgell said tribal nations are their neighbors and should be treated as such. He also said that the state and tribal nations have to work together.

Jake Merrick, local radio host and former Oklahoma state Senator, was pleased that the state Supreme Court affirmed tribal nations’ right to hunt on their own lands, during a March 30 candidates forum.

Democratic candidate Cyndi Munson, Oklahoma House Minority leader, said in a recent press release that her caucus supports tribes.

“The Oklahoma House Democratic Caucus supports tribal sovereignty and acknowledges that our tribes fill important gaps in our education and healthcare systems, as well as other areas throughout our state,” Munson said. “I am extremely grateful for the work our tribes have done and continue to do despite vicious attacks on them by the Governor.”

A respectful working relationship between tribal nations and the state has shifted significantly since the last gubernatorial race in 2022.

“I think every one of them [Oklahoma governor candidates] has said something about it,” Stopp said. “[It’s] different than four years ago. It was an issue in the governor’s race, but it wasn’t a good issue. Here everyone’s saying yes, we want to change the tone and start the conversation differently. So I think as far as Indian voters go, that conversation is going to change regardless of who wins.”

Dawnland

In Maine, Gov. Mills repeatedly refused to sign a law that would strengthen tribal jurisdiction and recognize Wabanaki Nations right to access federal Indian laws. She vetoed the bill twice despite overwhelming support from state legislators.

“We’ve had multiple opportunities to send [legislation] to the governor’s desk and not just party line votes,” said Maulian Bryant, executive director of the Wabanaki Alliance and former Penobscot ambassador. “We generally have Democratic support, but we have gotten Republicans voting on these issues too. So, the governor has seen some great bipartisan work reach her desk and has still decided to veto some of these efforts.”

In order for tribes to access federal Indian laws, the state has to approve it. The Wabanaki Alliance, created to educate the people of Maine about tribal sovereignty, has been working diligently to amend the Maine Indian Claims Settlement Act of 1980.

Through the settlement, tribal nations ceded land in exchange for $81.5 million. However, it also drastically limited tribal sovereignty, and brought tribes under the jurisdiction of the state. Tribal nations that predate the state, are subjected to state jurisdiction and treated more like municipalities. The act was meant to be a living document but the state resisted changes for decades.

The Wabanaki Alliance has been able to increase tribal sovereignty and self-governance one legislation or amendment at a time. Throughout her two-terms, Mills has resisted a complete overhaul of the 1980 act and this created tension between the governor and tribal nations.

“If we had a governor that came in and fully embraced the inherent rights and inherent sovereignty of our people, and fully recognized that, it would strengthen our communities and it would also uplift the entire state of Maine,” said Bryant, who is Penobscot. “Our tribal communities are near rural places that could really use economic opportunities and could really use tribal businesses that are able to grow without all of these bureaucratic restrictions. We really are coming from a place of friendliness and we want to be good neighbors and we want to uplift the communities around us.”

The Wabanaki Alliance held a gubernatorial candidates forum in March where nine governor candidates participated:

Shenna Bellows, Democrat
Rick Bennett, Independent
John Glowa, Independent
Troy Jackson, Democrat
Derek Levasseur, Independent
Hannah Pingree, Democrat
Nirav Shah, Democrat
Angus King III, Democrat

None of the eight Republican candidates participated.

Most of the gubernatorial candidates generally supported increasing tribal sovereignty, recognizing inherent rights and working with tribal nations. Angus King III said he wasn’t educated on the topic enough to make any commitments and would have to look into it. This sentiment was shared by John Glowa and Derek Levasseur.

Hannah Pingree, Rick Bennett, Shenna Bellows and Troy Jackson firmly supported tribal sovereignty for Wabanaki Nations.

“If a governor comes in, and isn’t afraid of recognizing tribal sovereignty and sees it as an opportunity, I think we could see some real progress for everyone,” Bryant said.

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Maine

The 10 Most Popular Restaurants in Portland, Maine, Back in 1996

Published

20 hours ago

May 13, 2026

Press Room

The 10 Most Popular Restaurants in Portland, Maine, Back in 1996

It seems commonplace now that people visit Portland, Maine, for the food.

Portland is home to a mix of classic and new restaurants that people travel long distances to experience.

But that wasn’t always the case. Looking back 30 years ago, Portland, Maine, was home to delicious restaurants that were not home to many frills or fanfare.

Some of those restaurants are still rolling along today, others failed to move forward.

Here’s a look at the 10 most popular restaurants in Portland, Maine back in 1996.

Back Bay Grill

Officially opening its doors in 1988, the Back Bay Grill quickly became one of the places for fine dining in Portland, Maine.

In 1996, it was one of only a handful of restaurants within the city that would be considered upscale.

The Back Bay Grill ended its lengthy run when it closed permanently in 2022.

Becky’s Diner

Opening in Portland’s waterfront in 1991, it didn’t take long before Becky’s Diner was a regular part of the working waterfront’s routine.

As the working waterfront began diminishing, Becky’s has managed to transform itself into a place locals still enjoy while simultaneously serving as a tourist destination.

35 years later and Becky’s is still going strong.

Granny’s Burritos

Opening in 1995, Granny’s Burritos has taken on an almost mythical presence for that fondly remember it.

Granny’s called several different spots around time home over the years but remains fondly remembered for its stellar nachos and signature burritos.

The last iteration of Granny’s Burritos officially closed in 2017.

Fore Street

Officially opening in 1996, Fore Street is widely considered the restaurant that took Portland, Maine, and put it on the map for food.

Almost from the day it opened, Fore Street became a cornerstone to fine dining in the city and laid the groundwork for many other upscale restaurants to follow.

Fore Street still remains one of the most popular restaurants in Portland, Maine, 30 years after it initially opened.

Squire Morgan’s

Now home to Cutie’s, the corner of Market and Milk streets was once home to one of Portland’s most popular pubs called Squire Morgan’s.

Squire Morgan’s had a fantastic run in the city through the 80’s and early-90’s before a fire burned the restaurant in 1996.

Squire Morgan’s rebuilt but it was never the same and closed permanently in 1998.

DiMillo’s Floating Restaurant

There is something unique and elegant about dining aboard a floating restaurant. That has been the draw for DiMillo’s since it opened in 1982.

Like Back Bay Grill, DiMillo’s was one of a handful of restaurants in Portland during the mid-90’s where people could visit and receive upscale service and dining.

Despite the restaurant scene changing drastically around it, DiMillo’s remains a destination restaurant for many visiting Portland.

Silly’s

Even amongst a slew of restaurants serving pub grub and classic New England fare, Silly’s always stood out.

It was a quirky spot with a eclectic menu that people consistently flocked to, especially on the weekends. It became a staple in the city throughout the 90’s.

Silly’s had a couple of starts and stops in Portland in more recent times before finally reestablishing itself in Standish.

The Sportsman’s Grill

Opened in 1952, the Sportsman’s Grill on Congress Street was a staple of dining in Portland, Maine, for decades.

The restaurant was sports themed as the name would suggest and evolved over the years to draw in sports fan and casual diners.

1996 proved to be one of the final years for the Sportsman’s Grill as it closed permanently in 1997.

The Great Lost Bear

Originally known as Grizzly Bear, the Great Lost Bear got a name change in 1981 and really grasped a rapid fanbase throughout the 80’s.

The Great Lost Bear has always been known for its large menu and larger portions and was one of the first spots in town to fully embrace craft beer and champion it.

The Great Lost Bear remains a favorite for many as it approaches its 50-year anniversary.

Walter’s

Originally opening its doors in 1990, some credit Walter’s as a stepping stone restaurant to what most see throughout Portland today.

It was a cornerstone upscale restaurant throughout the 90’s and eventually sold in 2004.

Walter’s moved from its original location at 15 Exchange Street to 2 Portland Square in 2009 and operated there for years before closing permanently in 2019.

The New York Time’s Best Restaurant Lists Feature These 7 Maine Spots

Gallery Credit: Sean McKenna

61 Maine Restaurants That Closed in 2025

Gallery Credit: Sean McKenna

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Maine

Data centers are coming for rural America

Published

1 day ago

May 13, 2026

Press Room

Data centers are coming for rural America

At its peak, the Androscoggin paper mill in Jay, Maine, a rural town about 67 miles northwest of Portland, employed about 1,500 people — until a pulp digester exploded in 2020, forcing the mill to close permanently.

In 2023, the 1.4 million-square-foot facility was purchased through a joint venture by JGT2 Redevelopment and a number of other holding and capital companies. The project is led by developer Tony McDonald. Over the next three years, McDonald and his team broke down the mill’s machinery and shipped it to Pakistan, and worked to clean up the industrial site for resale. That resale agreement was finalized earlier this year, according to McDonald — turning Jay into the latest flashpoint over giant data centers in America.

Maine is particularly appealing for data center developers for its relatively cool year-round temperatures, lax land-use statutes, and 54 percent renewable energy mix, the eighth highest in the nation. There is a handful of planned data centers around the state, which recently prompted the state legislature to pass a bill ordering an 18-month moratorium on permits and building of any proposed data center that consumes more than 20 megawatts of power. Lawmakers wanted to pause construction in order to study data centers’ impact on local economies, the power grid, and the environment.

But that bill, which would have been the country’s first, was vetoed by Maine Gov. Janet Mills last month. In her veto, she cited one overriding reason: jobs. A $550 million facility proposed for the shuttered paper mill in Jay, she argued, would create 125 to 150 permanent, high-paying positions in a town that had watched its largest employer close.

From mill towns in Maine to farm counties in Indiana to desert plots outside Abilene, Texas, data center developers are telling local governments: Bring us in, give us what we need, add some tax breaks, and the jobs will follow. More than 35 states have responded by offering incentives and more to attract the industry.

There’s little research into whether massive industrial sites actually deliver the long-term economic gains they promise, but early reports suggest otherwise. Experts say that rural communities often lack the governmental expertise to properly assess how data centers might impact an area. According to recent Pew Research Center data, 67 percent of planned data centers in the US are headed to rural areas, and 39 percent are going to counties that currently have none. As data center development scales rapidly, it’s becoming clear that what rural communities around the country are actually getting isn’t jobs, but a power- and water-hungry industrial facility that temporarily employs about as many people as a midsize restaurant.

The data center fight in Maine

Originally, Tony McDonald had planned to sell the mill to an oriented strand board company called Godfrey Forest Products, which would have employed approximately 150 people, he said. When federal tariffs killed the financial backing for that project, McDonald pivoted to an idea he’d been getting pitches about.

“Most of the people that were contacting us, you know, they were all hat and no cattle,” McDonald said. He fielded multiple calls from what he terms “data center cowboys” who claimed to have one of the seven big tech companies as a client and were looking for a place to build a new data center. When he’d dig deeper on the caller, he’d find that they didn’t actually have the backing they claimed.

After a few conversations, he began pursuing a data center partnership with Sentinel Data Centers, a New York-based company that specializes in data centers serving the healthcare, financial, and hyperscale industries, according to its website. Sentinel did not respond to multiple requests for comment for this story.

McDonald says that, as he understands it, the project in Jay will be a neocloud data center, a specialized facility built to deliver high-performance GPU computing for AI and machine learning workloads. If a neocloud data center is going into the old mill, it will require more than 100kW of energy per rack, according to industry standards, and will need either direct-to-chip or immersion cooling, both of which require ample space and water resources.

“Most of the people that were contacting us, you know, they were all hat and no cattle.”

— Tony McDonald, JGT2 Redevelopment

While McDonald has repeatedly said that he is not interested in tax breaks for the project, he did want to leave the door open for potential tax benefits down the road if the town determines that it’s worth it. Just before Mills vetoed the moratorium, the Maine state legislature passed a law that excludes data centers from some of Maine’s tax breaks for businesses, but it leaves the door open for local municipalities to offer tax break agreements and other municipal incentives. That could spell trouble for small communities like Jay, hoping for a tax windfall to help them invest in schools, community buildings, and roadworks.

Maine state Rep. Melanie Sachs, the sponsor of the Maine moratorium bill, claims that McDonald did not inform the Jay Select Board of the new plan to turn the mill into a data center until late February 2026, just days before her moratorium bill was scheduled for a floor vote. Her bill was first introduced to committee on January 30th.

The Select Board heard McDonald’s presentation in March and voted 4-0 in support, according to The Maine Monitor. The moratorium bill passed both the state House of Representatives and Senate on April 14th, and Mills vetoed it on April 24th, citing the job creation in Jay as her reason.

Sachs, who chairs Maine’s House Energy, Utilities and Technology Committee, said her legislation was never about banning data centers. “This bill was about creating the playbook,” she said. “And we were told, ‘Don’t worry your pretty little heads about it, data centers are not coming to Maine anytime soon.’ They came anyway, and without a framework in place, towns have no mechanism to evaluate the claims developers are making.”

“Even if it’s 30 jobs, that means a lot to Jay, then, okay, but you’ve swept away protections for 1.4 million Mainers for 30 jobs,” Sachs said.

The economics of data centers

Michael Hicks, the director of the Center for Business and Economic Research at Ball State University, is an economist and a professor who last November published one of the first causal analyses of data center employment effects in the United States. He studied data center openings across 254 Texas counties and measured their actual effect on local long-term employment.

He found that net job creation was effectively zero. Whatever long-term jobs existed at data centers were being offset by losses elsewhere in the same sector.

”As you drive by a data center, you see people working on it,” Hicks said. “You see construction workers. The hotels locally are packed. But there’s no net pulse of that. A lot of these workers are there for three weeks to do their part of it, and then they’re gone … The real question is whether there are permanent jobs associated with data centers, and in Texas, the answer is no.”

“A lot of these workers are there for three weeks to do their part of it, and then they’re gone.”

— Michael Hicks, Ball State University

Texas serves as an ideal test bed because of its isolated grid and a mix of large, fast-growing metros and tech hubs alongside rural, remote towns, which mirrors the rest of the country. As Hicks puts it, it’s essentially a mini-United States with its variety of regions, and the economic lessons learned in Texas can be widely applied across the country.

Rural towns are often “outgunned” when trying to negotiate deals with large data center builders, said Anthony Elmo, public education funding defender at Good Jobs First, a nonprofit research center focused on corporate and government accountability in economic development.

“They don’t have the resources to negotiate,” said Elmo. “They don’t know what to ask for. They don’t have the legal expertise, and they don’t feel like they have the leverage, which I think is part of the issue.”

On the national level, the math isn’t much better, either. Business Insider recently reported that the national subsidy for data centers exceeded $2 million in costs per permanent job, and in some cases, like one in New York, companies received nearly $77 million in tax breaks for a facility that created exactly one permanent position.

Microsoft’s Quincy, Washington, facility, which is roughly comparable to the initial plan in Jay, employed as many as 500 workers during construction but now operates with just 50 full-time employees. The type of data center being built determines where on that spectrum of long-term employment a community lands. Neocloud data centers, like the one coming to Jay, can require 30 to 50 full-time staff, depending on size.

“Of those, say, 50 jobs, a chunk of them are maintenance, a chunk of them are technicians in charge of backup generators. The high-tech jobs make up maybe 10 percent of the facility,” Elmo points out. And many times, data center companies will count remote workers in other states as employees of the state in which the data center is located. “We may get a little bit of an economic effect from that, but it isn’t nearly as much as if it were a physical person in Maine buying goods and adding to the local economy,” he said.

Most of the lobbying around data centers focuses on job creation and “upskilling,” or training workers for new or better-paying jobs. But according to researchers, even the retraining argument holds little water.

Just under 30 percent of Jay’s population has a bachelor’s degree or higher, while 90 percent have a high school diploma, according to recent census data. And, as Ball State University’s Hicks says, education matters for upskilling.

In the 1800s, when farm laborers were sent into the workforce in the Midwest, they had a basic education that made them trainable for factory work. Following World War II, men and women returned from the factories and the battlefield having learned many new skills, and in the post-Civil Rights South, more Black men and women became educated and entered the workforce in ways they had been unable to before.

Neocloud data centers, like the one coming to Jay, can require 30 to 50 full-time staff, depending on size

As Hicks points out, each of these three industrial revolutions only worked because of the big, new supply of educated people ready to move into those jobs. By contrast, the US currently has negative net immigration, low birth rates, and consistently underfunded education; there is no equivalent human-capital “wave” to support a similar jobs boom in data centers and AI, he says.

“The waves of industrialization accompanied waves of human capital into the United States,” Hicks said. “So, where do we think there’s this surge of employment surrounding data centers that can mimic those three events?”

”The big tech companies are investing in upskilling the construction trades,” Elmo points out, citing OpenAI’s recent agreement with NABTU and noting that in fully developed data center markets, electricians and HVAC maintenance workers float from project to project as contractors. “For states that don’t have developed data center infrastructure, like Maine, it’s not a permanent job. It’s an 18-month job. That’s it.”

The jobs promise, Hicks argues, distracts from the one benefit a data center can reliably provide to a rural community: tax revenue.

Using the Jay data center as an example, Hicks says that a $550 million data center in a town of 4,620 people, where the median home value is around $215,000, would carry an assessed value exceeding the combined worth of every home and every business in the town. The former mill had a tax abatement but generated roughly $1.8 million in tax revenue for Jay in its last year of operation, according to the Livermore Falls Advertiser. Taxed at the same rate as any other commercial property, that revenue could fund schools, rebuild infrastructure, and attract residents for generations.

”You could make that town into a Hallmark Channel town with those sorts of tax dollars, and then jobs would follow,” Hicks said. But that all depends on whether or not the town decides to grant the future project special tax breaks.

Rural towns are often “outgunned” when trying to negotiate deals with large data center builders

It’s not clear precisely how much tax revenue the data center could generate, as of this reporting, because there are still many unknowns about the project, including who Sentinel’s clients might be, the type of data center that will be built, what kind of tax incentives the town Select Board might offer, and even how many jobs the data center might bring to Jay.

McDonald’s job estimates have been all over the map, ranging from 100 to 150 as the project has progressed. He says the numbers he gave the Select Board and the state legislature are based on what Sentinel has told him, but warned that he’s “not a data center guy.”

What data centers actually mean for jobs

Ultimately, this is a tech ouroboros. The same data center infrastructure, subsidized as a jobs program, is purpose-built to reduce human labor, and the AI it powers is explicitly designed to automate work. Communities are being asked to trade tax revenue and grid capacity for jobs in an industry whose core product is labor replacement.

“It’s the biggest capital expenditure since the Manhattan Project, and it isn’t going to create tens of thousands of jobs in the long term,” Elmo said. “It’s not some economic boom. Meta, Amazon, OpenAI, Oracle, they’re shedding jobs in real time while spending billions on data centers so that other organizations can shed additional jobs through AI. At some point, people need to ask more critical questions about this.”

As Hicks points out, rural America is being sold the same bill of goods it has been sold for 50 years. “Civic leaders are living 75 to 150 years in the past,” and framing these data center deals in the old industrial-boom mindset without the educational and demographic conditions that made previous booms possible.

The mill didn’t save rural towns, nor did the manufacturing center, the call center, or the Amazon warehouse. Based on the economic data, data centers will not save them either, and the one thing that could genuinely help — treating the facility’s tax base as a community windfall rather than a negotiating chip — is precisely what most states are legislating away.

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