Trump Taj Bankruptcy Left Many Contractors Angry
Source: Associated Press
Trump Taj Bankruptcy Left Many Contractors Angry
By BERNARD CONDON, AP BUSINESS WRITER ATLANTIC CITY, N.J. — Jun 29, 2016, 3:41 AM ET
The contractor who provided the onion domes for the Taj Mahal casino had to eat $2 million in losses. The contractor who supplied the Carrara marble from Italy ended up filing for personal bankruptcy. The contractor who put in the bathroom partitions had to lay off his brother.
A quarter of a century has passed since Donald Trump refused to pay in full 253 contractors who help build his Taj in Atlantic City. But for many of them, it could have happened yesterday.
"We got next to nothing," says Michael MacLeod, whose 40-person studio made the giant elephant statues at the casino's entrance. "I took a big hit."
After the Taj opened in April 1990, the self-anointed "King of Debt" owed $70 million to contractors employing thousands who built the domes and minarets, put up the glass and drywall, laid the pipes and installed everything from chandeliers to bathroom fixtures. A year later, when the casino collapsed into bankruptcy, those owed the most got only 33 cents in cash for each dollar owed, with promises of another 50 cents later. It took years to get the rest, assuming the companies survived long enough to collect.
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"If ethics or morality has nothing to do with business," Rosenberg says, "he's a very good businessman."
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Read more: http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/wireStory/trump-taj-bankruptcy-left-contractors-angry-40211016
Also from the AP: Trump Taj Bankruptcy Leaves 'Little Guy' Contractors Angry
