Yes, you could build in NYC in the 70s and 80s without going through the mob, and most builders did. They just paid the cost of union labor. The mob's racket was soliciting some builders to buy their cement in exchange for using non union labor. The builders that did so knew what they were doing, Trump being no exception. The mob's racket wouldn't work if most projects weren't built with union labor. The ongoing presence of union labor had to exist for the extortion to work. So, bullshit. Trump built his empire knowingly using mob connections. He was friends with mob lawyer Roy Cohn, who taught him how to get away with it, too. Trump and Roger Stone still use some of Cohn's old trickery today. Pizzaboy? He's an anonymous commenter on a website, for crying out loud. lol.

"...the successful annihilation of organized crime's subculture in America would rock the 'legitimate' world's foundation, which would ultimately force fundamental social changes and redistributions of wealth and power in this country. Meyer Lansky's dream was to bond the two worlds together so that one could not survive without the other." - Dan E. Moldea