http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-trump-20110511,0,2184711,full.story
By Geraldine Baum, Tom Hamburger and Michael J. Mishak, Los Angeles Times
May 10, 2011, 3:43 p.m. Donald Trump, the developer and would-be presidential candidate, portrays himself as a swashbuckling entrepreneur, shrewder and tougher than any politician, who would use his billionaire's skills to restore discipline to a bloated and bankrupt federal government.
In his near-constant denigration of big government, however, Trump glances over an expensive irony: He built his empire in part through government largesse and connections.
From his first high-profile project in New York City in the 1970s to his recent campaigns to reduce taxes on property he owns around the country, Trump has displayed a consistent pattern. He courted public officials, sought their backing for government tax breaks under extraordinarily beneficial terms and aggressively countered any resistance to deals he negotiated.
He has boasted of manipulating government agencies, misleading officials in one case into believing he had an exclusive agreement to develop a property and then retroactively changing the development's accounting practices to shrink his tax bill. In New York, Trump was the first developer to receive a public subsidy for commercial projects under programs initially reserved for improving slum neighborhoods. Incentives he pioneered have now become the norm in the powerful New York real estate community.
Karen Burstein, a former auditor general of New York City, reviewed a major Trump project in the 1980s and concluded he'd "cheated" the city out of nearly $2.9 million. Decades later, Burstein said she is still appalled at the way Trump operated.
"It's extraordinary to me that we elevated someone to this position of public importance who has openly admitted that he has used government's incompetence as a wedge to increase his private fortune," she said in a recent interview.
U.S. Rep. Jerrold Nadler (D-N.Y.) fought Trump over hundreds of millions of dollars in federal funding that the developer wanted for a luxury apartment complex in Nadler's district.
"He sought to abuse the taxpayer and stretch the law," Nadler said. "He said he ought to get a massive government subsidy. I said, 'Listen, Mr. Trump, if you think this is a good project, you spend the money.' "
In a phone interview last week, Trump was unapologetic about pressing for government tax breaks, noting that he had used them not only for his own profit but to spur development in foundering parts of the city.
Referring to how he managed to win a 40-year tax abatement for rebuilding a crumbling hotel at Grand Central Station a deal that in the first decade cost taxpayers $60 million Trump said, "Someone said, 'How come you got 40 years.' I said, 'Because I didn't ask for 50.' "
He said his success at manipulating city and state governments was itself an argument for his presidential candidacy.
"When I work for myself, I try to make the maximum profit," he said. "If I run [for president] and if I win, I will no longer care about myself. I'll be doing the same kind of things for this country."
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