MGM CEO Blasts `Hate Mongers,' Will Match Employee Donations

(Bloomberg) -- MGM Resorts International denounced “hate mongers and white supremacists” in a letter to employees Friday, offering to match their donations to civil rights groups including the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People.

“You have my commitment that we will vigorously and zealously continue to reject hate speech and hate-based actions in any form,” Chief Executive Officer Jim Murren wrote, telling workers he felt compelled to speak after the violence in Charlottesville, Virginia, and the terrorist attack in Barcelona this week.

MGM Resorts is the largest casino operator on the Las Vegas Strip and employs about 77,000 people worldwide.

Murren, a lifelong Republican, broke with his party last year and endorsed Hillary Clinton for president. In the letter to employees, he listed seven groups worthy of employee contributions, including the Southern Poverty Law Center, the Council on American-Islamic Relations and the Anti-Defamation League.

Murren’s announcement comes after a tumultuous week in which President Donald Trump, himself a former casino executive, blamed protesters on “both sides” at a white supremacy rally in Virginia of stirring up trouble. His comments prompted a number CEOs to resign from two presidential advisory boards and Trump to disband them.

Fellow casino executives, including Wynn Resorts Ltd. CEO Steve Wynn, who is finance chairman of the Republican National Committee, and Las Vegas Sands Corp. CEO Sheldon Adelson, one of the largest Republican donors, have been silent about the events in Charlottesville in which protesters shouted “Jews will not replace us.”

To contact the reporter on this story: Christopher Palmeri in Los Angeles at cpalmeri1@bloomberg.net.

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Crayton Harrison at tharrison5@bloomberg.net, Rob Golum, Josh Friedman