Eric Berger casually drops this rumour in his recent article on commercial space stations:

Building space station modules is really hard. Despite billions of dollars and efforts by NASA and the European Space Agency to build new deep space station modules—the HALO and iHAB elements of the now-shelved Lunar Gateway—have both faced significant delays. There are rumors that both modules are actually corroded, perhaps beyond repair. Inevitably, NASA expects private providers to face similar delays.

Highlighted by u/FistOfTheWorstMen in The Other Place.