The Flim-Flam Man

If anything salutary emerges from Donald Trump‘s “cynical branding exercise,” it’s that it may finally expose an epic “scam” once and for all. I refer, of course, to the Trump-generated myth that he is a successful casino operator. True, he might have been — decades ago — although history suggests otherwise. While “thousandaire” Trump’s potential political rivals might not care how many times his gambling empire has gone into bankruptcy, the media is certain to have a jolly good time digging through the dustbin of history.
For instance, did you know that Trump was reduced at one point to sending casino boss Nick Ribis around to his siblings, rattling the tin cup to keep The Donald operational? Or that his net worth is routinely inflated by exponential amounts (as much as 63X)? Or that he diverted bank loans to his businesses into alimony payments? Or that his casinos bled red ink for at least 10 years straight? Not surprisingly, the Cliff Barnes of the gaming industry is running on a platform of kleptomania, not fiscal responsibility.

Oh, and he’s a cheap bastard, too. ($6.7 million in charitable donations over a 20-year period … $335K a year.) Not one penny for the victims of Hurricane Katrina but a thousand clams for some Church of Scientology “medicine.” Small wonder that he leaves the charitable fundraising to the pathetic and attention-hungry contestants on his Sunday-night comedy show. Note below that he’s already laying out the rationale for beating a retreat from the presidential fray, although the biggest news flash of all may be Trump’s declaration, “I have a friend.” Wow, there’s at least one person in America he hasn’t exploited … yet.
It’s between Trump’s conscience (if he has one, which seems unlikely) and himself that he’s pandering to people like this. The collateral damage to his casino brand, however, may be severe. The Donald’s divisive public rhetoric is the sort of thing that drives one’s negatives through the roof and his Atlantic City casinos had a ghastly March. Not only were their returns disproportionately bad for the market but even reliable Trump Taj Mahal was way, way down.

Coincidence? Quite possibly. But Trump’s incessant cable-news bloviations may be repelling many of his bread-and-butter customers … no matter how many times he makes tacky remarks about his good relationship with “the blacks.”As for business fallout, well, that’s Lasry’s problem, not Trump’s, right? Wrong. To survive, Trump’s casinos will have to expand to other states. But they’re a bad debt risk, have scant value as collateral, their figurehead is an increasingly problematic messenger and previous attempts to broaden the Trump brand (in Indiana and California) were short-lived. The long-term prognosis for the company is bad, possibly terminal.

Lasry’s agreement to keep Trump on as the orange public face of his eponymous casinos may turn out to be a Faustian pact. It’s a good thing for him that he signed a similar deal with Ivanka Trump. Better get her up on the billboards, stat, Marc. As for The Donald, he’s got a glass jaw and couldn’t even take a punch from your grandmother (who’s also probably a lot smarter about managing money, too). If he gets sufficiently drunk on poll numbers to turn his publicity stunt into something serious, those candidate forums are going to make must-see TV. Trump will hit the canvas early and often, probably accompanied by loud squeals of “No fair!”