Trump executive allegedly drugged rival in GM Building bid

A new book chronicles the nefarious history of the office tower

The GM Building and Donald Trump
The GM Building and Donald Trump

The General Motors Building on Fifth Avenue and 58th Street — one of the priciest office buildings in America – has had its share of landlords over the years from Bill Zeckendorf to Harry Macklowe. But according to a new book, Donald Trump was its most notorious.

When Donald Trump was in the midst of negotiations for the building, his head of acquisitions, Abe Wallach, allegedly drugged a rival with sleeping pills on a flight. While the man was out, Wallach went through the man’s valise in search of sensitive documents, Vicky Ward told the New York Post. Ward’s new book “The Liar’s Ball: The Extraordinary Saga of How One Building Broke the World’s Toughest Tycoons,” chronicles the history of the building.

Wallach told Ward that at the time he worried that he gave his rival too big a dose and that his victim might die.

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“This is an exposé of the kill-or-be-killed world of these real-estate tycoons — the dark side of capitalism,” Ward told the Post.

Trump only briefly owned the building with Indiana businessman Stephen Hilbert, who, Ward says, “married the woman who jumped out of his son’s birthday cake.” [NYP]Christopher Cameron