The Smart Money on Casinos

The Power Play at Suffolk Downs

The goal of all this maneuvering is to be ready to pounce if and when the governor’s gaming legislation passes. Though Adelson, who’s met in person with DiMasi, is jawboning on his own behalf, his rivals have hired an army of highpowered local lobbyists. That’s especially true for Suffolk Downs, the one serious casino contender not keeping its head down. It spent more on lobbying last year than Trump and Harrah’s combined, in the process enlisting big guns like former Speaker of the House Charles Flaherty to help press its cause.

When Fields bought Suffolk Downs last year, it wasn’t because he likes horses. Everyone knows that he came to open a casino, so he’s had no reason to hide his ambition. Instead, he’s made a practice of pressing the flesh and wooing influential decision-makers. Mayor Tom Menino, for one, has already endorsed a Suffolk Downs bid. It also certainly helps to have plugged-in businessman Joe O’Donnell (said to have been the one to put Menino and Fields together) as part of the track’s ownership group. With the governor’s proposal calling for a seven-person panel to make the decision on who gets the three casino licenses—but not requiring it to go with the highest bidders—the Suffolk Downs bunch seem to be banking on connections to help push them over the top.

Like the politician who becomes the frontrunner by entering the race first, though, Fields must be looking over his shoulder. He surely took note when Donald Trump, his one-time casino partner turned nemesis, made headlines in November when he began searching for a piece of Massachusetts property of his own. But it’s Loveman and Adelson, more than anyone, who should be keeping Fields up at night. The big-spending Adelson ponied up $1.5 billion to build the Venetian in Las Vegas, and is currently wrapped up in a $3.5 billion development in Singapore while simultaneously undertaking a $6 billion project for seven hotel-casinos on the Chinese islands of Macau. His MO might well be to look at the locals prepping a bid for Suffolk Downs, laugh, and propose a plan they couldn’t dream of competing with. After all, if he could spearhead Vegas-style casino gambling in Communist China, you’d think he’d be able to handle Massachusetts.

But then again, China doesn’t have the State House.