Trusting Trump: A Devastating Pre-existing Condition

Kristin Urquiza was clear and eloquent in describing her father’s trust in Donald Trump as the pre-existing condition that led to his death from COVID 19. 

It makes one wonder how many other Americans amongst the over 180,000 who have died so far, lost their lives because they trusted Donald Trump.

• the people who trusted Trump when he said the coronavirus was a hoax
• the people who believed Trump when he said “the virus will go away by April”
• the people who trusted and emulated Trumps decision not to wear a mask
• the people who eschewed social distancing and followed Trumps encouragement to congregate in restaurants, bars, houses of worship and recreational sites
• the people who took hydroxyhloroquine and those who actually ingested bleach or disinfectants because they trusted Trump instead of medical professionals
• the parents who buried their children because they believed Trump’s assertion that the coronavirus doesn’t affect kids.

Sadly, trusting Donald Trump is not just a pre-existing condition that leads to loss of life. It can also cause loss of livelihood and life savings. 

Well over 6,000 individuals each lost thousands of dollars believing the fraudulent Trump University promise of a successful real estate career. Trump ultimately agreed to a $25,000,000 settlement, partially compensating these people whom he had scammed and defrauded.

‘Little Guy’ Contractors Still Angry at Trump Taj Bankruptcy

Excerpts from ATLANTIC CITY, N.J. (AP), BERNARD CONDON, June 28, 2016

A total of almost $70,000,000 is still owed to 253 subcontractors who trusted the Trump organization to honor their contracts and pay for services rendered and products delivered.  In many of these cases, the unpaid companies were small family businesses, passed on from generation to generation. Most of them could not afford to fight Trump and his army of lawyers in court.  Some went bankrupt and never recovered from the pre-existing condition of trusting Donald Trump.

Weak from heart surgery and a sepsis infection that would soon kill her, Patricia Paone was resting at home when an apparition appeared on the TV — a famous businessman who had struck a deal with her husband years before.

“He’s a crook!” she roared. “I can’t listen to this.”

Patricia Paone’s husband, Mario, had built Hastings Paving by hard work, and had become a respected figure in his industry. He had billed Trump $1.3 million and gotten only $100,000 despite repeated requests for more. Documents filed with regulators suggest Trump gave Paone about a third of what he was owed over the next year. “We took a beating,” former Hastings controller Howard Black says.

A quarter of a century had passed since Donald Trump refused to pay $1.2 million to Hastings Paving. But for Paone and others like her — the dozens of contractors and their families who never got all they were owed — it could have happened yesterday.

The contractor who provided the onion domes atop the Taj had to eat $2 million in losses. The contractor who supplied the Carrara marble from Italy ended up filing for personal bankruptcy. The contractor who put in the bathroom partitions had to lay off his brother.

“Anytime I went to Atlantic City and I’d see that Trump sign, I’d think of the little guys,” says bankruptcy lawyer Arthur Abramowitz who worked with contractors for years after the casino itself went bankrupt. “It wasn’t just the money; a lot of these guys went into depression.”

“We got next to nothing,” says Michael MacLeod, whose 40-person studio made the giant elephant statues at the entrance to Taj. “I took a big hit.”

Marty Rosenberg, former vice president of Atlantic Plate Glass, was among two dozen contractors and their survivors caught in the aftermath of the Taj bankruptcy who were interviewed by The Associated Press. “If ethics or morality has nothing to do with business,” Rosenberg says, “he’s a very good businessman.”

Five hundred miles away, in Ashtabula, Ohio, Robert Morrison of the Molded Fiber Glass Co. was pressing his workers to finish the domes and minarets and other faux Moorish ornaments in time for the April opening — and worrying about who was going to pay for all of it. An invoice sent a few weeks earlier for $1.4 million still hadn’t been paid.

One of the hardest hit was John Millar, a marble supplier who was owed $3.9 million. Millar eventually had to lay off workers, shut down his business Avalon Commercial, close many of his retail stores and borrow from friends to make ends meet.

This barely scratches the surface of the devastation that Trump has left in his wake. We cannot let the United States succumb to the pre-existing condition of trusting Donald Trump.