Years after casino went bust, Gary still skeptical of Trump
GARY, Ind. (AP) — Donald Trump swooped into Gary, Indiana, on his private jet and pledged to make the down-on-its-luck city great again.
It was 1993, and the New York mogul was wooing officials in the mostly black city to support his bid to dock a showboat casino along a Lake Michigan shoreline littered with shuttered factories. Trump and his representatives later told state gaming officials he would leverage his "incomparable experience" to build a floating Shangri-La, with enough slot machines and blackjack tables to fill city coffers and local charities with tens of millions each year, while creating scores of well-paid jobs for minority residents.
"We are looking to make this a real peach here, a real success," Trump said of the project.
Today, as the Republican presidential nominee pursues black voters with vows to fix inner-city troubles, many Gary residents say his pitch to solve the problems of crime and poverty is disturbingly familiar. Like others who have done business with Trump, they say their experience offers a cautionary tale.
Little more than a decade after investing in Gary, Trump's casino company declared bankruptcy and cashed out his stake in the boat — leaving behind lawsuits and hard feelings in a city where more than one-third of residents live in poverty. Trump's lawyers later argued in court that his pledges to the city were never legally binding.
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