"a back door to the U.S. financial system."
February 21, 2018 8:29 AM   Subscribe

A Chinese Casino Has Conquered a Piece of America
Imperial Pacific’s overnight domination of Saipan has generated deep unease among the island’s citizens, many of whom are convinced that their home has been bought. The company, they believe, set out to take over a little piece of America, politicians and all. Given the billions of dollars at stake, it’s not surprising someone would try. What’s shocking is that, so far, it seems to be working.
posted by the man of twists and turns (15 comments total) 14 users marked this as a favorite
 
Pour one out for the real victims, the sweatshop owners.
posted by Space Coyote at 9:08 AM on February 21, 2018 [2 favorites]


So under US jurisdiction, used for money laundering, and has CIA people involved? Well, I have to say I have a first working theory on why it might not be as tightly enforced as one might imagine.
posted by jaduncan at 9:34 AM on February 21, 2018 [4 favorites]


It might have been slightly shocking in 2015.
posted by Halloween Jack at 9:35 AM on February 21, 2018 [2 favorites]


When laws have become inconvenient to the company, they’ve been flouted; when the requirements of its contract with the government have become onerous, they’ve been removed; when legislators have tried to interfere, they’ve been ignored.
Colloquially known as the Uber Method.
posted by Mitheral at 12:29 PM on February 21, 2018 [4 favorites]


Well, the rot set in as early as 2014, so there's that. Coincidentally, the the Saipan-da, the downright weird local marketing gimmick is to be retired next year after twenty years service. Or maybe not coincidentally.
posted by BWA at 12:31 PM on February 21, 2018 [1 favorite]


Also I'm constantly amazed that what appears to be a criminal money laundering operation with a licence to print money doesn't try to keep a low legal profile by adhering to building, construction and worker legislation. Turn this into a resort building project staffed entirely by US Union workers and the cost might double or triple (a rounding error in their cash flow) but a lot of the leverage and attention getting injuries and deaths just disappear. Heck it would turn it into enthusiastic support despite the Chinese angle in a lot of sectors. But the people involved just can't seem to help themselves from being corrupt and sketchy with no concern for workers.
posted by Mitheral at 12:50 PM on February 21, 2018 [3 favorites]


But the people involved just can't seem to help themselves from being corrupt and sketchy with no concern for workers.

Those are the sprinkles on top of the cupcake.
posted by The_Vegetables at 1:15 PM on February 21, 2018 [1 favorite]


For an American face to lead the development, the company hired Mark Brown, an Atlantic City native who’d run Donald Trump’s casino empire. Brown was so revered by his Trump colleagues that some executives grew mustaches to mimic his own, and in 2004 he appeared at the future president’s side on The Apprentice. But after Trump’s company declared bankruptcy, his star fell.

Meanwhile, it’s becoming more and more difficult to see daylight between Imperial Pacific’s agenda and that of Torres’s administration. Both company and government in 2017 used the same lobbying firm: Avenue Strategies, the D.C. influence shop co-founded by former Trump adviser Corey Lewandowski.


So that's a thing.
posted by saysthis at 2:28 PM on February 21, 2018 [2 favorites]


This was a stunning piece of reporting and writing. Yes, I can see how Saipan would be a great place for such corruption but the brazen nature is staggering. With all of this now public, I'm hoping the FBI will prioritize any convictions in Saipan.
posted by gen at 6:21 PM on February 21, 2018 [1 favorite]


Those are the sprinkles on top of the cupcake.

I'm not sure they are. I mean, the real grift here is smuggling money out of China. That's a big deal, one presumes, to China, but it's not like anyone in the US gives a shit. Hell, it's good for the US and bad for China, so game on.

They are almost guaranteeing themselves bad press and bad optics on the US end through the lax safety enforcement, worker injuries, illegal laborers, etc. For a very small sum, they could have avoided all that just by not cutting so many corners. And their real scam, which is entirely against China, would have been entirely on the up-and-up so far as anyone on this end was concerned. (Someone, somewhere, is still taking a risk when they run the "junkets" and front Chinese people USD to gamble, and then recoup the debt in CNY. Presumably those people are kept at arms length, much like how drug cartels keep the risky street-level stuff at arms length.)

But yeah, it's almost like they just can't stop themselves from trying to fuck some construction workers out of what amounts to pocket change, hence why it came to anyone's attention as anything other than "Vegas in the Marianas", which is what they could have pulled off if they'd hired a legitimate construction company and generally operated like the Vegas casinos do, which is very carefully screwing only the right people.
posted by Kadin2048 at 8:19 PM on February 21, 2018 [3 favorites]


I'm curious what the cost is to change the renminbi into dollars this way vs doing it legitimately.
posted by Pembquist at 10:08 PM on February 21, 2018


The company, they believe, set out to take over a little piece of America, politicians and all. Given the billions of dollars at stake, it’s not surprising someone would try. What’s shocking is that, so far, it seems to be working.

Friend, you and I clearly operate with different definitions of the word "shocking."
posted by rokusan at 11:21 PM on February 21, 2018


Pembquist: "I'm curious what the cost is to change the renminbi into dollars this way vs doing it legitimately."

Isn't the whole scam because there isn't anyway to convert in a legitimate manner?

Also can anyone ELI5 how the scam works from the point of view of the people running it? Aren't they left with a tonne of Chinese currency that they won't be able to get out the country?
posted by Mitheral at 11:29 PM on February 21, 2018 [1 favorite]


The US has been abusing Saipan since it first took possession of the island. It's a US territory, but US law doesn't apply, especially US labor laws. And a great many Congresspeople (including my very own Lamar Smith!) have voted explicitly to make and keep Saipan exempt from those pesky laws.

The rot was there **LONG** before 2014 and blaming it on the Chinese is just xenophobia coupled with a convenient excuse.

Way back in the early 2000's Tom DeLay was such a major player in keeping Saipain a lawless haven for the most abusive and exploitative capitalist slime that he was sometimes called "The Man from Saipain", and it was not meant in an affectionate way. He was treated like a visiting king when he went to Saipain, which he did often and with his extended family.

Saipan has the closest thing to chattel slavery you'll still find in the USA. Most workers are immigrants, they're kept in cages, worked 12 to 16 hours per day seven days a week, paid pennies per hours, and subject to beatings, rape, torture, and murder by the overseers.

It's so openly horrible that even the Republicans initially agreed to reforming the law with regard to Saipan and in 2000 the US Senate unanimously passed a bill sponsored by then Senator Frank Murkowski (father of current Senator Lisa Murkowski, aren't political dynasties lovely?) that would have tried to make the island subject to US labor law and actually enforce it there.

Tom DeLay, personally stopped it from even coming to a vote in the House, and that was the end of that.

Saipan is one giant US owned and operated sweatshop, producing clothing that can be labeled "Made in the USA" but without any of those pesky laws that keep employers (slave owners in all but name) from beating, starving, torturing, raping, and murdering their employees on a whim.

After DeLay stopped Murkowsi's bill the US government collectively shrugged its shoulders and ignored labor conditions in Saipan, and Tom DeLay continued to visit the luxury resorts on the island for free.

We can't blame China for the atrocities that are daily life in Saipan, they're just taking advantage of conditions our own government created.
posted by sotonohito at 6:56 AM on February 22, 2018 [6 favorites]


Wow--I didn't think that it was possible to think less of Tom DeLay, but then this.
posted by Halloween Jack at 9:01 AM on February 22, 2018 [2 favorites]


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