Billionaire activist investor Carl Icahn said yesterday that he planned to sell his shuttered Trump Taj Mahal casino in Atlantic City, N.J., likely bringing an end to his troubled relationship with the city, Reuters reported. Icahn, a special adviser to U.S. President Donald Trump, the original owner of the casino, will sell the Taj Mahal — possibly at a loss — instead of investing the $100 million to $200 million it needs to keep going, according to a statement on his website. Icahn closed the 26-year-old Taj Mahal in October 2016 after failing to reach a new contract with union employees. New Jersey legislators accused him of planning to close the casino only briefly in order to reopen it shortly after with lower wages and benefits for employees. In an attempt to prevent that, the state's legislature last year passed a bill that would disqualify individuals who closed a casino since January 2016 from holding a gambling license in the state for five years. That legislation was vetoed yesterday by New Jersey Governor Chris Christie, a Republican, who called it a “transparent attempt to punish the owner of the Taj Mahal casino."
