On Wednesday, Tony Rodio, President and Chief Executive Officer of Tropicana Entertainment announced that the Trump Taj Mahal casino will shut down for good following Labor Day Weekend, which is just a month away.
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The strike and closure affects more than 1,000 workers at the Trump Taj Mahal.
Business magnate Carl Icahn, whom Forbes values at $17 billion, took over the Taj after Trump Entertainment Resorts went through bankruptcy in a restructuring plan approved by a federal judge in 2015.
The workers have been fighting to get back healthcare and pensions ever since, rejecting an offer worth roughly half of what the union’s members have at other Atlantic City casinos including the Taj Mahal’s sister casino, The Tropicana. Under his tenure, the three Atlantic City casinos he developed-the Taj is the last one operating under the Trump name-suffered from underinvestment and poor management, as he loaded the casinos with debt and milked them for cash.
ATLANTIC CITY, N.J. (AP) A northern New Jersey man is heading to prison after admitting to following five women and robbing them at gunpoint in their Atlantic City hotel room. “[We] have fiduciary duties to shareholders and our directors can not just allow the Taj to continue burning through tens of millions of dollars”.
An exact shutdown date for the Taj Mahal has not yet been set. In all, he spent over $80 million to save the Taj, which eventually emerged from bankruptcy hell earlier this year in February.
The Trump Taj Mahal remains open during the strike.
The Atlantic County Prosecutor’s Office says 39-year-old Rahime Adams was sentenced to 30 years behind bars for the August 2014 robbery. “I would never have thought Carl Icahn was so one-dimensional”.
Bob McDevitt, President of Unite Here Local 54, is, to put it gently, pissed that Icahn has, in his opinion, let this happen. But McDevitt said Icahn preferred to “slam the door shut on these long-term workers just to punish them and attempt to break their strike”.
Unite-HERE is making the case that Icahn and Trump share the same values when it comes to business.
Unfortunately, in the time since he purchased the property, Icahn has refused to give into demands from Unite Here Local 54, the union representing the workers of the Taj Mahal. Only the Taj’s casino dealers, cashiers and security staff are not affected.
Icahn told The Associated Press on Wednesday that he had lost almost $100 million on the Taj Mahal in the past 18 months, including money he spent to keep it afloat during bankruptcy court before he even owned it.
At an average wage of less than $12 an hour, the Trump Taj Mahal workers are among the lowest-paid in Atlantic City, having lost their health-care benefits as well as other labor contract protections in bankruptcy.
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This video includes images from Getty Images and Trump Entertainment Resorts.
