The year was 1983. Tenants of 100 Central Park South wanted to put up a Christmas Tree in the lobby of the building. Unfortunately for them, there were tenants in rent-controlled apartments and he wanted them out.
Trump is campaigning on helping the working class. He actually has a history of waging war on them. In this case:
- He attacked them with specious lawsuits against his tenants. Most of these were thrown out and in one case he had to pay the defense’s legal fees.
- He attempted using empty apartments to house the homeless hoping to scare out tenants. The city saw through it and declined his “offer.” (When a refugee organization asked if he could take in Polish exiles, they were rebuffed.
- He hired a new management company, Citadel Management, who promptly neglected the building. Repairs weren’t made and security lapsed, causing burglaries to spike under their care.
And finally..
Which brings us to the Christmas tree. Young Donald and his agents had not allowed either a tree or any other decorations for the first two Christmases, but the tenants decided to try again last December.
They wrote a letter to Citadel asking permission to put a tree in the lobby - stressing that all costs would be assumed by the tenants. A sour letter came back, saying that tenant ''activities'' had ''made it quite difficult for Management to feel that a relaxed, 'holiday season spirit' relationship exists at the building.'' But Citadel said it would not block the project if the tenant spokesman, John Moore 3d, would sign a bizarre legal document in which he would have agreed, among other things, to have the decorations ''comply with applicable governmental regulations'' and to take them down should any tenant complain that they ''infringe upon his or her religious beliefs.'' This document never got signed because, fortuitously, Citadel's maintenance employees in the building got some signals crossed and put up the tree while the negotiations were still in progress. Citadel's front office fumed but could do nothing. Young Donald keeps saying - as recently as two Sundays ago on television - that his attempts to get the tenants out are justified because the building is occupied by ''many multimillionaires'' paying rents of $250 a month. Only a handful of the tenants can be described as rich; most are either average working people or elderly men and women on fixed incomes, such as Social Security, who have lived there many years. And although the rents are either rent-controlled or rent-stabilized, the average is several hundred dollars higher than $250. In any case, Young Donald knew all this when he eagerly bought the building in 1981.
Full article in the New York Times archives.
Finally, just to add to the absurdity: Eric Trump: My Dad Ran Because The White House Christmas Tree Is Now A “Holiday Tree”
Searching through news archives is a treasure trove of Trump atrocities. Sneak preview of my next post: Trump screws up negotiations with a football coach because he can’t keep his mouth shut on national TV.