Trump's Wealth Built on Stiffing Scores of Contractors, Businesses and Employees for Years, Report Finds
A pattern of not paying bills in full is traced.
A major investigation by USA Today has revealed one of the sordid secrets to the profit making in Donald Trump’s business empire: don’t pay your bills in full, whether from small businesses, contractors or even the lawyers you’ve hired to stonewall them.
The overall ugly picture that emerges goes far beyond Trump’s use of bankruptcy court, where debts can be forgiven or restructured depending on their category and type of federal bankruptcy filing. What’s most provocative about USA Today’s reporting, which goes beyond previous accounts of the same tactics or his mob connections, is how Trump has a longstanding pattern of ignoring his bills and walking away from debts owed contractors and employees.
“At least 60 lawsuits, along with hundreds of liens, judgments and other government filings reviewed by the USA Today Network, document people who have accused Trump and his businesses of failing to pay them for their work,” the newspaper wrote Friday. “Among them: a dishwasher in Florida. A glass company in New Jersey. A carpet company. A plumber. Painters. Forty-eight waiters. Dozens of bartenders and other hourly workers at his resorts and clubs, coast to coast. Real estate brokers who sold his properties. And, ironically, several law firms that once represented him in these suits and others.”
That summation is the tip of a later iceberg, and one that should make Trump’s white, working-class followers shudder—because he has a habit of stiffing blue-collar laborers.
http://www.alternet.org/election-2016/trumps-wealth-built-stiffing-scores-contractors-businesses-and-employees-years-report
