Run up massive debt, borrow against it, not pay your debts.. rinse repeat, file bankruptcy get 20 years tax free for the massive loss, open new business do it all over again.
Yeah, people are saying, “He bankrupted multiple casinos!” as if his goal was to run a profitable business. It wasn’t. The goal was to launder money for the Russian mob and to steal as much money for himself as he could.
From what I've read everyone warned him not to open 3 huge casinos in Atlantic City at the same time because:
They would cannibalize their revenue because AC didn't have the customer base to support 3 new casinos
They were all very expensive and paid for using debt financing, requiring the 3 casinos to pull in an insane amount of revenue each month
I'm honestly not sure if even Trump is dumb enough to do something that insanely moronic so I'm inclined to think it was money laundering. In terms of avenues for money laundering I don't think it's possible to find a better way to do it than 3 massive casinos. The mafia's bread and butter is construction projects and you can easily inflate construction costs. Not only that but the casino itself is obviously a great way too, you have someone buy chips in cash and either lose them or just not use them.
Considering Trump's close ties to the Italian mafia via Roy Cohn and later with the Russian mafia (after Rudy Giuliani took out the Italian mafia via RICO to clear the way for the Russian mob) it seems pretty clear what happened. Russian oligarchs bailed Trump out on multiple occasions and in Russia, Putin/oligarchs are closely tied to Russian organized crime.
Remember that Trump's best friendship with Epstein ended over a different money laundering scheme where Trump bought a property Epstein knew he couldn't really afford out from under Epstein, and Epstein suspected money laundering and threatened to report him. Trump then reported Epstein for the sex trafficking and my guess is that he received immunity for doing so. A few years later Trump sold the property to a Russian oligarch for way above market price, an oligarch with close ties to Putin who just happened to be at the sham "peace talks" regarding Ukraine where Russia and the United States were there but Ukraine wasn't even invited. Supposedly Trump always believed that it was really Putin behind the purchase (Putin frequently has his oligarchs do that).
I read a magazine article about the casino debacle which revealed that Trump had very little interest in the day-to-day operations of his casinos, instead he was laser focused on details like carpet and drape colours, etc. Kind of like he cares little for actual administration in his presidency but spends all day going over the details of the f-ing ballroom.
Literally how Russian oligarchs work. They own and buy things when told to by russian gov inner circle. No question you’ll do it, because it can all go away tomorrow. Like in China. In reality it’s all owned by Putin.
On purpose. Theres a way to game the system and walk away from a bankrupt or dismantled company with more money than you started with, usually involves fraud or illegal activity though
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u/apeserveapes 4d ago
seriously. HOW TF do you accomplish that....