Catherine Fitts was an investment banker before her govt service and has designed and closed over $25 billion of transactions and investments to-date and has led portfolio and investment strategy for $300 billion of financial assets and liabilities.
A former housing official who worked under President George H. W. Bush has made an astonishing claim that the U.S. government spent years funneling money into the creation of a secret underground “city” where the rich and powerful can shelter in the event of a “near-extinction event.”
Catherine Austin Fitts, who served as the assistant secretary of Housing and Urban Development for Housing between 1989 and 1990, made the shocking allegations during an appearance on former Fox News host Tucker Carlson’s podcast, although there is no concrete evidence to support her claims.
Fitts, 74, who is originally from Philadelphia, cited research by Michigan State University economist Mark Skidmore, who released a report in 2017 stating that he and a team of scholars had uncovered $21 trillion in “unauthorized spending in the departments of Defense and Housing and Urban Development for the years 1998-2015.”
At the time, Skidmore noted that he first began investigating the unreported spending after he heard Fitts “refer to a report which indicated the Army had $6.5 trillion in unsupported adjustments, or spending, in fiscal 2015.”
“Given the Army’s $122 billion budget, that meant unsupported adjustments were 54 times spending authorized by Congress. Typically, such adjustments in public budgets are only a small fraction of authorized spending,” the report noted.
Initially, Skidmore said he thought Fitts had made a mistake, stating that he assumed she had meant to say $6.5 billion, not trillion.
“So I found the report myself and sure enough it was $6.5 trillion,” he said.
According to Fitts, who worked as an investment banker before joining Bush’s administration, that money was used to fund the development of what she described as an “underground base, city infrastructure and transportation system” that has been kept hidden from the public.
“One of the things I’ve looked at in the process of looking at where all this money is going is the underground base, city infrastructure, and transportation system that’s been built,” she said.
“We have built an extraordinary number of underground bases and, supposedly, transportation systems.”
She told Carlson that she spent two years researching where the $21 trillion had gone, alleging that she uncovered evidence that there are 170 secret facilities in the U.S. alone, explaining that she and a team of investigators combed through “all the data and all the allegations on underground bases” in order to make a “guess” as to how many might exist.
Additionally, Fitts alleged that several of these bases are located beneath oceans—not just underground.
“We systematically went through and tried to guess estimate our guess—this is totally a guess—of how many underground bases [there are], both underground in the United States, but also underground under the ocean around the United States.
“And our estimate was 170 with a transportation network connecting them,” she said.
When Carlson asked what the “purpose” of these underground bases is, Fitts responded that they would be used if a “near-extinction event” was believed to be on the horizon.
However, she added that she believes these so-called bases could also be used by the government to carry out “secret” projects, such as a “secret space program.”
Carlson responded by claiming that he actually knew “a contractor who worked on one in Washington, D.C.,” stating: “I remember him telling me about a power box, like a transformer box, on Constitution Avenue. … He told me [that] was actually the exit, the egress from the White House.
“And I thought, that’s kind of crazy in the middle of this big city where I live … you could build something like that without me knowing it.”
Carlson said he had always assumed that those kinds of bases were only located in D.C.—and that they were meant specifically for some kind of “nuclear war,” to which Fitts responded: “Some of it is. It’s preparation for catastrophe.”
As for how these alleged cities and facilities are powered, Fitts said she believes the government has found a way to generate breakthrough energy that she believes is being used to keep them going.
“I’m convinced that this energy exists. If you look at a lot of the really fast ships, flying around the planet, they’re not using classical electricity,” she claimed.
Fitts’ controversial claims come just a few months after a Virginia-based company called SAFE (Strategically Armored & Fortified Environments), unveiled plans for a $300 million luxury, members-only doomsday bunker called “Aerie.”
The company says the facility will offer “AI-powered” medical care, “wellness programs,” and the ability to “blend protection and luxury” in a way that has never been done before.
SAFE says it planned to build the bunkers—which will cost each entrant a $20 million membership fee—in all 50 states, but was going to construct the first in Virginia because of its proximity to D.C.
“It’s the wealthiest state per capita,” a company spokesperson previously told Realtor.com®. “It’s ground zero for the finest demographic for something like this in the world.”
CATHERINE AUSTIN FITTS served as managing director and member of the board of directors of the Wall Street investment bank Dillon, Read & Co. Inc., as Assistant Secretary of Housing and Federal Housing Commissioner at the United States Department of Housing and Urban Development in the first Bush Administration, and was the president of Hamilton Securities Group, Inc.
More at:
Catherine Austin Fitts Drops Bombshell in Tucker Carlson Interview: How Legal Elites Betrayed America for Profit
“It wasn’t an accident,” Fitts said. “It was a decision. A decision to strip the country of its assets, hollow out its communities, and leave ordinary Americans to deal with the wreckage.”
A recent interview with former Bush administration official Catherine Austin Fitts, offered a sharp critique of America’s ruling class and the legal system, alleging that both played a central role in the nation’s economic and institutional decline.
Speaking with Tucker Carlson on his independent media platform, Catherine Fitts pulled no punches. According to her, a devastating shift unfolded during the 1990s, one that saw America’s political, corporate, and legal elites abandon national interests in favor of their own financial gain.
“It wasn’t an accident,” Fitts said. “It was a decision. A decision to strip the country of its assets, hollow out its communities, and leave ordinary Americans to deal with the wreckage.”
What stands out isn’t just the accusation of betrayal, it’s the central role she claims the legal profession played in paving the way.
How the Law Allegedly Enabled America’s Downfall
Fitts outlined a pattern that will sound grimly familiar to many attorneys and policy watchers: laws, contracts, and court decisions quietly crafted not for the public good, but for private enrichment.
Among the tactics she cited:
- Trade agreements that devastated American manufacturing.
- Privatization deals that shifted public assets into private hands.
- Deregulation that gutted consumer and worker protections.
- Strategic litigation and judicial appointments that tilted the playing field further toward the powerful.
At nearly every critical juncture, she argues, lawyers were the ones designing the framework — ensuring that the system served those already at the top.
“Lawyers weren’t just bystanders,” Catherine Fitts said. “They were architects.”
Growing Distrust in American Institutions
Fitts’s warning comes as trust in the American legal system hits new lows. A recent Gallup survey shows confidence in the U.S. Supreme Court and the judiciary slipping to levels not seen in decades.
She argues that unless the legal community confronts its role in this shift, the gap between the law’s ideals and its reality will only widen.
“If lawyers are only working to help the powerful consolidate more power, then who’s left to defend the people who actually need the law?” Catherine Fitts said.
Across the United States, concerns over economic inequality, deteriorating infrastructure, and declining public trust in institutions continue to grow.
According to Catherine Austin Fitts, these challenges are not the result of random misfortune. They are the predictable consequences of legal and policy decisions made decades ago, shaped and endorsed by influential figures within the nation’s legal and political systems.
Without meaningful reform, America’s legal foundations risk continuing to erode, not from external threats, but from within.
More at:
More Stories
Bounced! GOP senator — who voted to convict Trump — loses Louisiana primary as president takes victory lap: ‘Political career is OVER!’
Trump’s Beijing trip is looking as successful as anyone could’ve hoped
A major watchdog says data centers are wreaking havoc on North America’s power grid