It's structured as a refund of lease payments that these companies have already made, so they can claim it's more like canceling a project than actually paying

It's structured as a refund of lease payments that these companies have already made, so they can claim it's more like canceling a project than actually paying them off. I'm sure a case could be made that this is not legal, but you can just toss that on top of the giant pile of illegal actions.