Donald Trump is going to Washington, New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie may be going with him, and Atlantic City—a place they both know intimately—is losing its right to self-government.
The two events aren’t directly related; Atlantic City’s problems were greater than Trump, and Trump’s swindles weren’t confined to New Jersey. But in a strange twist of fate, the state takeover over Atlantic City was approved the same week the city’s most infamous mogul was elected president of the United States.
The troubled boardwalk town, locus of Trump’s dishonest payment practices and repeated business failures, hit a new low on Wednesday with the announcement that New Jersey would initiate a state takeover. The head of New Jersey’s Local Finance Board, longtime Chris Christie official Timothy Cunningham, will have the power to sell municipal assets, fire city employees, and renegotiate union contracts, the New York Times reports.
Atlantic City has been subject to some form of state supervision since 2010, but the last four years have been particularly rough. Hurricane Sandy pummeled the boardwalk in 2012, causing millions in damage. Newer, fancier casinos have opened across other states in the Northeast, drawing away the clientele. Five boardwalk casinos have closed since 2014, putting a huge dent in what had been an economic engine for the fading beach resort since the late 1970s.
One big issue in Atlantic City will be what happens to the Municipal Utilities Authority, which provides the city’s 39,000 residents with water. Critics of the state takeover have worried Trenton could try to privatize the authority, or otherwise wring savings from its operation. The water crisis in Flint, Michigan, developed because a state-appointed emergency manager directed the city to send contaminated water from the Flint River through faucets as a cost-saving measure.
It was in Atlantic City that Trump stiffed hundreds of workers and made four trips to bankruptcy court in the early 1990s on the way to eventually offloading his casinos, two of which are now closed. The third, the Trump Marina Hotel Casino, is called the Golden Nugget. “Atlantic City fueled a lot of growth for me,” Trump told the Times in May. “The money I took out there was incredible.” The newspaper later speculated that Trump’s staggering losses in Atlantic City might have allowed him to stop paying federal income taxes entirely, a hunch Trump appeared to confirm during a presidential debate with Hillary Clinton. He was at one point the largest employer in town.
Atlantic City can still go to court and contest the state takeover, but will negotiate with state officials first. Those painters and decorators who never got paid for their work on Trump properties should note that their old boss has a new project on his hands: being president of the United States of America.
