Jackpot

Casino mogul Steve Wynn is behind millions in donations, but manages to stay off of the Mother Jones 400

Image: AP/Wide World Photos

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One morning last November, a small jet owned by casino mogul Steve Wynn lifted off from Washington, D.C., bound for Las Vegas and carrying a trio of Senate GOP leaders: Majority Leader Trent Lott (R-Miss.), Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), and Bill Frist (R-Tenn.). That evening they gathered for cocktails at Wynn’s Shadow Creek Country Club, listening to him brag about all the jobs being created by the gambling industry.

But Wynn, who runs Mirage Resorts, did much more than just talk at the gathering: He had brought together a group of about three dozen gambling executives whose companies gave $100,000 to the GOP over the weekend. And, in the months that followed, the gaming industry poured $1.2 million into GOP coffers. Wynn headed the pack with a well-timed $250,000 contribution from Mirage in March: It arrived just days after the introduction of a measure that would have ended tax deductions for gambling losses. Leaving nothing to chance, the industry lobbied Lott and McConnell, who pressed the bill’s sponsor, Sen. Dan Coats (R-Ind.), to pull the measure.

Tight relationships with prominent Senate leaders have made Wynn the gambling industry’s most powerful political player. And Mirage has certainly led the charge, donating nearly $1 million since 1991, including contributions from Wynn, company executives, their spouses, and the company’s PAC, according to the Center for Responsive Politics. He often gives through Mirage, and so he stays off lists such as the Mother Jones 400. (Others, such as Sheldon Adelson [No. 74], Stanley Fulton [No. 108], and Arthur M. Goldberg [No. 168] aren’t as wise.)

Well known for his flashy style, perennial tan, and sleek coiffure, the 56-year-old Wynn demonstrates his political shrewdness by covering his bets with Democrats, too. In June, Mirage dropped a $200,000 check in the mail to the Democratic Party — just days after Sen. Robert Torricelli (D-N.J.), a longtime industry ally and an acquaintance of Wynn’s, was quoted in the National Journal questioning why so much money was going to the GOP, given growing criticism of gambling from prominent conservative Republicans such as Gary Bauer and presidential candidate Sen. John Ashcroft.

Such care and feeding of political leaders has paid off well: In 1996, when Congress and the Clinton administration created a National Gambling Impact Study Commission to probe the social and economic effects of gambling, Congress granted the commission only limited subpoena powers, and placed a number of strong industry allies on it. Still, the commission’s final report is due next June, and casino interests are nervous about how critical it will be and whether it will lead to calls for federal regulation.

That sets the stakes high for the gambling industry — and, in particular, Wynn. Anyone wondering why Wynn would want friends covering his bets need only read about his latest and greatest venture: the $1.6 billion Bellagio, a lavish Las Vegas casino that houses an art collection worth a reported $300 million, with paintings by Gauguin, Van Gogh, and Monet, some of which he reportedly hopes to sell for a tidy profit.

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WE'LL BE BLUNT

It is astonishingly hard keeping a newsroom afloat these days, and we need to raise $253,000 in online donations quickly, by October 7.

The short of it: Last year, we had to cut $1 million from our budget so we could have any chance of breaking even by the time our fiscal year ended in June. And despite a huge rally from so many of you leading up to the deadline, we still came up a bit short on the whole. We can’t let that happen again. We have no wiggle room to begin with, and now we have a hole to dig out of.

Readers also told us to just give it to you straight when we need to ask for your support, and seeing how matter-of-factly explaining our inner workings, our challenges and finances, can bring more of you in has been a real silver lining. So our online membership lead, Brian, lays it all out for you in his personal, insider account (that literally puts his skin in the game!) of how urgent things are right now.

The upshot: Being able to rally $253,000 in donations over these next few weeks is vitally important simply because it is the number that keeps us right on track, helping make sure we don't end up with a bigger gap than can be filled again, helping us avoid any significant (and knowable) cash-flow crunches for now. We used to be more nonchalant about coming up short this time of year, thinking we can make it by the time June rolls around. Not anymore.

Because the in-depth journalism on underreported beats and unique perspectives on the daily news you turn to Mother Jones for is only possible because readers fund us. Corporations and powerful people with deep pockets will never sustain the type of journalism we exist to do. The only investors who won’t let independent, investigative journalism down are the people who actually care about its future—you.

And we need readers to show up for us big time—again.

Getting just 10 percent of the people who care enough about our work to be reading this blurb to part with a few bucks would be utterly transformative for us, and that's very much what we need to keep charging hard in this financially uncertain, high-stakes year.

If you can right now, please support the journalism you get from Mother Jones with a donation at whatever amount works for you. And please do it now, before you move on to whatever you're about to do next and think maybe you'll get to it later, because every gift matters and we really need to see a strong response if we're going to raise the $253,000 we need in less than three weeks.

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