Donald Trump’s words in the New York Post were much different 16 years ago.
Donald Trump’s past in the casino industry is becoming a topic for voters in the 2016 U.S. presidential election. Trump’s unwillingness to release his tax records sent journalists to look at the last time he released tax information (1981), which revealed he had paid $0 in taxes that year, despite claims in 1987’s “Art of the Deal” that he made huge sums of money in the 1980s.
The debate over Donald Trump’s tax returns is likely to be an issue up until the November election, or at least until he releases his tax information, as all presidential candidates have done for decades. For his part, Donald Trump focused on an altogether different aspect of his past in the gambling industry.
Battle Against Tribal Gaming
Instead, Donald Trump pivoted to a 28-year old debate over tribal gaming. Before 1988, Las Vegas and Atlantic City had virtual monopolies over brick-and-mortar casino gambling in the United States. After a 1986 victory in the U.S. Supreme Court, Native American tribes began to push for tribal casinos. In 1988, President Ronald Reagan signed a tribal gaming bill into law, which gave Native American tribes the right to build casinos on their reservations (under certain circumstances).
At the time, Donald Trump became one of the most outspoken critics of deregulation of the casino industry, especially attempts to build casinos in New York. He claimed that tribal governments would never be able to police the kind of money which goes through casino accounting departments. Trump implied that the tribal casinos would become a hotbed of money laundering for organized crime and other criminal enterprises.
St Regis Mohawk Indian Attack Ads
Trump’s efforts were not confined to public pronouncements. In the early 1990s, the St. Regis Mohawk tribe of New York State lobbied to receive a tribal casino. Political attack ads were launched, which characterized the St. Regis Mohawn Indians as a bunch of criminals.
The commercial said, “Are these the new neighbors we want? The St Regis Mohawk Indian record of criminal activity is well documented.”
New York officials were convinced that Donald Trump funded those ads, a contention that Trump denies to this day.
His actions paint a different story. Despite his multiple public statements over the past few months that he never settles out of court, in 2000, Donald Trump and associates agreed to pay a $250,000 fine to New York state regulators in the St Regis Mohawk case, though those fined never admitted guilt. Regulators had found evidence which linked Trump to the St Regis Mohawk attack ads, prompting the quick settlement.
What Donald Trump Said in 2000
At the time of the 2000 settle, the New York Post published this apology to the St Regis Mohawk Indians:
“Donald Trump, Roger Stone, Thomas Hunter, on behalf of Trump Hotels and Casino Resorts, Ikon Public Affairs and the New York Institute for Law and Society, respectfully apologize if anyone was misled concerning the production and funding of the lobbying effort.”
What Donald Trump Says in 2016
When the St Regis Mohawk Indian case became an issue earlier this week, Trump released a statement through his spokesperson, Hope Hicks. The statement read, “I was 100 per cent right about this — it was the Jack Abrahamoff (sic) scandal.”
Jack Abramoff Scandal
Trump was referring to Jack Abramoff, the former Republican lobbyist who was such a force in Washington politics during the Bush 43 years. In 2006, Abramoff pleaded guilty to defruading Native American tribes. Abramoff would claim to lobby for tribal casino interests, while associates would fight against such initiatives, based on moral grounds. The controversy and subsequent delays were good for business.
Part of the Jack Abramoff case involved charges he corrupted officials. Republican U.S. Representative Bob Ney pleaded guilty to criminal charges that he took $160,000 in gifts from Jack Abramoff. Texas Sen. Tom DeLay, among the most powerful of Republicans at the time, had a fall from power when he was linked by PBS Frontline and other news sources to Jack Abramoff’s shady dealing.
FT: Trump’s Predictions Were Wrong
The Financial Times believes Donald Trump is taking credit for a foreknowledge he did not possess. They point out that Donald Trump was not warning about corruption in the political party he now leads, but instead was talking about stereotypical East Coast style organized crime.
FT.com quoted Donald Trump from his 1993 hearings before Congress as an example of the warnings Donald Trump gave about tribal gaming. Claiming organized crime would control the Indian casinos, he said before a House subcommittee that he couldn’t see how “an Indian chief is going to tell Joey Killer to please get off his reservation”.
Trump, who owned three Atlantic City casinos at the time, said of his potential competition, “Organised crime…is rampant on the Indian reservations. It will be the biggest scandal ever or one of the biggest scandals since Al Capone in terms of organised crime.”
Kevin Washburn Cites the Facts
Kevin Washburn, a law professor at the University of New Mexico, said subsequent events had proven Donald Trump wrong. Washburn said that FBI had wire taps in the early 1990s showing organized crime had tried to gain influence in tribal casinos, but had failed. By the end of the decade, law enforcement officials had dismissed the possibility that tribal gaming would become a new frontier for the American mafia.
Washburn said, “By the very early 2000s, the Department of Justice stopped mentioning organised crime in its testimony before annual congressional oversight hearings on Indian gaming.”
Golden Age of Confirmation Bias
Thus, it hardly seems that Donald Trump was prescient in his warnings. None of this is likely to matter. Those who dislike Donald Trump are likely to take the St. Regis Mohawk case as further confirmation Trump is a liar and a slanderer, while supporters of Donald Trump are likely to point to his warnings as a sign of his foresight and moral compass. Living in the golden age of confirmation bias makes it easy to dismiss new evidence.
