With the closure of Trump Taj Mahal Atlantic City is now officially left with seven casinos. On Monday the Taj Mahal officially closed its doors at 6am following a weekend of staggered shutdowns of its various entertainment offerings. This is the fifth AC casino property to close since four venues have already been closed in 2014. This closure also spells the end over 2,800 local jobs and thus bringing the total casino job loss to 11k since 2014.
Taj Mahal closed after two years of squabbling between the property owner, billionaire investor Carl Icahn and its unionized employees who were not able to come to an agreement that would have allowed the struggling property to run its operation. The Taj Mahal had already filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in September 2014, after which Icahn assumed the ownership of the property. But Unit here Local 54refused to accept a court ruling that allowed Icahn to scrap the pension and health benefits of unionized employees.
Icahan had already announced that he no longer saw a path to profitability in the month of August and then he filed the papers formally advising local regulators of his intention to shut the Taj in September this year.
Icahn even issued a statement on Monday saying – he’d lost $350m during his tenure as Taj Mahal owner and had expected a further $100m loss in 2017. Icahn said it was a “sad day” and that like many of the Taj’s former staffers, “I wish things had turned out differently.”
This magnificent property opened in April 1990, when it was under the control of current Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump. But the debt laden property filed for bankruptcy just one year later as its revenue was not sufficient to cover the interest payments on debt. However some interesting words are doing the rounds after The Taj Mahal Trump has only been closed for 24 hours that this Atlantic casino could rise from the dead in few months time.
Market is full of rumours that the Taj could reopen in few months with a workforce consisting entirely of non-union employees. On Tuesday, the Press of the Atlantic City quoted New Jersey state Sen.Stephen Sweeney suggesting that Icahn could be working on a “union busting” plan that would make way to reopening of Taj under a new name with a more reliable workforce.
