Trump used to the mob to help build his empire

[Goro]

Per this article: http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/trump-swam-in-mob-infested-waters-in-early-years-as-an-nyc-developer/ar-AAfwnbz?li=AAa0dzB

[DonDadda59]

Haven't read the article but anyone who was doing business in Atlantic city before the 00s was doing business with the mob, whether they wanted to or not. You couldn't build anything there, especially Casinos, without Nicky Scarfo giving the thumbs up.

EDIT- Just read the article, they didn't even touch Atlantic City which I'm sure would turn up just as much corruption. But really, can't blame the Donald... like the article says he didn't do anything illegal. Unsavory yes, but the mob controlled most of the labor unions and construction projects in America during that time. If you were a developer then, you were in business with the mob. There was no way to avoid it.

[KevinNYC]

Haven't read the article but anyone who was doing business in Atlantic city before the 00s was doing business with the mob, whether they wanted to or not.
Well the blew up the Chicken Man in Philly last night.
And they blew up his house too
Down on the boardwalk they're gettin' ready for a fight
gonna see what them racket boys can do

[DonDadda59]

Well the blew up the Chicken Man in Philly last night.
And they blew up his house too
Down on the boardwalk they're gettin' ready for a fight
gonna see what them racket boys can do

:applause:

The Philly Mob in the 80s-90s was no joke. They loved bombings ala the Sicilians. RIP Chicken Man Testa.

[KevinNYC]

Trump used to the mob to help build his empire
I don't think this is an accurate way to put it. He certainly worked with mob related companies, but in general the mob are the parasites and developers are the host. If I was a fishmonger would you say I used the mob in my business because if didn't pay them off, my fish wouldn't get unloaded and would rot in my trucks?

From my understanding, this would by far down the list of sins of the Trump Organization. I would put not renting to black people and his involvement with a different form of organized crime, higher up on the list. That different form was the Brooklyn Democratic Party. The article goes into that. The Trumps were major, major contributors to Hugh Carey who got elected Governor and Abe Beam who got elected mayor.

As a developer who work involved concrete and glass, you could very, very easily be working with the mob without even knowing it. The mob operated in these industries as a cartel of small independent companies. Developers learned not to ask too many questions. Actually, I see the article does go into this.

In New York City, the mafia families ran what authorities called the “concrete club,” a cartel of contractors that rigged bids and squelched competition from outsiders. They controlled the Cement and Concrete Workers union and used members to enforce their rules.

Nearly every major project in Manhattan during that period was built with mob involvement, according to court records and the organized crime task force report. That includes Trump Tower, the glittering 58-story skyscraper on Fifth Avenue, which was made of reinforced concrete.

In those days a cubic yard of concrete in NYC cost at least double what it cost elsewhere. Every window that went into a high rise had a one or two buck "mob tax" tacked on to it. The mobs had taken over the construction unions so completely that they were able to use the leverage to extort higher prices. Even city contracts had these costs. If an independent concrete company would try to move in, all of a sudden, there would be labor trouble and they would find their concrete drying in the mixing trucks.


On a big, unionized construction project, the mob tax, extorted principally from subcontractors, could be huge. The painters’ unions and carpenters’ unions, under Lucchese crime family control, extracted a hefty 10 percent tax on contracts. Drywall contractors paid a 2 percent mob tax. Every window installed on public projects and on private unionized projects required until 1991 a $1 or $2 mob charge. In the mid-1980s, when mob control of sectors of the industry was at its height, the tax often totaled 5 percent of a major project. These days, say prosecutors, even if the mob tax is 1 or 2 percent, that still amounts to $250-500 million yearly added to the cost of building in the city. The NY Times would editorialize about mob corruption in the paper, but would pay a garbage carter would was a member of the mob cartel, because otherwise, their garbage would back up.

[KevinNYC]

This book is very good on how the mob garbage cartel in NYC worked. Written by the cop who went undercover for years on the case

http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51HbaTw3MZL.jpg

They were a collection of small companies but they would rig the prices among themselves to even out the take. Independent companies that tried to move in could find their trucks burned or their drivers crippled.

[KevinNYC]

:applause:

The Philly Mob in the 80s-90s was no joke. They loved bombings ala the Sicilians. RIP Chicken Man Testa.
Do you know that song?

Also the article does touch on Atlantic City.[QUOTE]Trump also dealt with mob figures in Atlantic City, where he was pressing to go into the casino business, according to court records, gaming commission reports and news accounts. One of these figures, Kenny Shapiro, was a former scrap metal dealer in Philadelphia turned real estate developer on the Jersey Shore. Shapiro also was an associate of the Scarfo crime organization, serving as a financier of mob activities in south Jersey and Philadelphia, according to a report by New Jersey authorities.

Shapiro worked closely with Daniel Sullivan, a Teamster who also was an FBI informant, documents show. Trump

[LikeMike]

Misleading title.

[BlakFrankWhite]

:applause:

The Philly Mob in the 80s-90s was no joke. They loved bombings ala the Sicilians. RIP Chicken Man Testa.

The Sicilians. :bowdown:

Most badass muhfkas in the history of crime.