TRUMP-BANKRUPTED CASINO IN ATLANTIC CITY FLATTENED

A spot on the Atlantic City Boardwalk where movie stars, athletes and rock stars used to party — and a future president honed his instincts for bravado and hype — was reduced to a dusty pile of rubble on Wednesday, Wayne Parry reported for the Associated Press (AP).

The former Trump Plaza casino was imploded after falling into such disrepair that chunks of the building began peeling off and crashing to the ground, endangering people, just like what the rioters instigated by defeated president Donald Trump did to the senators and congressmen at the US Capitol on Jan. 6.

A series of loud explosions around 9 a.m. rocked the building, which started to collapse in a wave from back to front until it plunged straight down in a giant cloud of dust that enveloped the beach and Boardwalk.

Overall, it took the structure less than 20 seconds to implode. Bob McDevitt, president of the main casino workers’ union, said the place oozed glamor and buzz when it first opened.

But things began to sour for Trump Plaza when Donald Trump opened the nearby Trump Taj Mahal in 1990, with crushing debt loads that led the company to pour most of its resources — and cash — into the shiny new hotel and casino.

"The moment that the Taj Mahal opened up, it began a decline for the Plaza,” McDevitt said. “In order to make sure the Taj Mahal was successful, they shipped all the high rollers from Trump Plaza and Trump’s Castle to the Taj, and they really didn’t invest in the Plaza much.”

The Trump Taj Mahal, one of the casinos acquired by Icahn, has since reopened under new ownership as the Hard Rock. Trump Plaza was the last of four Atlantic City casinos to close in 2014, victims of an oversaturated casino market both in the New Jersey city and in the larger northeast.

There were 12 casinos at the start of 2014; there now are nine.By the time it closed, Trump Plaza was the poorest-performing casino in Atlantic City, taking in as much money from gamblers in 8 1/2 months as the market-leading Borgata did every two weeks.

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