Too Much and Never Enough

Trump begins Chapter 9 with an anecdote about her grandmother being mugged in 1991. The anecdote establishes a timeframe to detail Donald’s life and business dealings throughout the 1980s and up to that point. She explains that Donald’s perceived success with the Grand Hyatt in 1980 led to the opening of Trump Tower in 1983 and eventually to his idea of becoming a casino operator in Atlantic City, which had legalized gambling a few years earlier. As his father’s influence on him waned, Donald purchased a casino in 1984 and a second one a year later. Those two ventures alone already carried billions in debt, but he continued buying and by 1990, he had purchased a yacht; a plane; Mar-a-Lago, his mansion in Florida; and the Taj Mahal, his third casino. The author points out that unlike the Grand Hyatt and Trump Tower, which were managed by other entities, his career as a casino owner would be “his first opportunity to succeed independently of his father” (135).

Banks kept lending and investors kept investing because of Donald’s reputation and name, but his debt was ballooning.