Lets focus on the fact they were never told about the tax. Would you like to lose your home because of a tax where notices were mailed to the wrong place?

If this situation were to happen to him, he would only have legal remedies, not the ability to use political influence (since he lacks sufficient capital). He could sue for reversal or buy it back. He would almost certainly lose the suit since it was his responsibility, as an adult, to tell the Government where to send the bill. The Government doesn't care why you failed to live up to your obligation of informing them, and you had over a decade to find and correct your mistake.

Buying it back would work, but cost more than buying someone's political influence to aid you since not only would there be a substantial up-front buy but also the property would be reassessed and have much greater on-going tax liability. However, he lacks the monetary capital to buy influence and banks will not send you money for that so you must be rich to get this special treatment. He is not rich, so he would get treated equal to anyone else who was not rich -- under the law.

The government works for the people, not the other way around. It has to follow basic rules of fairness, including making reasonable efforts to contact owners it already has names and addresses of before taking their property. The fact that anyone today believes otherwise is just a signal we are getting closer to needing our government to be replaced.

The property owners told the Government how to contact them and the Government obeyed their wishes.