How the Enquirer Betrayed a Mafia Don and the Donald

The first person to testify in the first-ever criminal trial of an American president is the former publisher of the National Enquirer. But the supermarket tabloid might not have been around to “catch and kill” stories about Trump’s sexual liaisons if it were not for the early financial support of another notorious New York celebrity, the gangster Frank Costello.

And while Trump is not known for his grasp of history, he’d do well to view Costello’s relationship with the Enquirer’s first publisher as a cautionary tale.

In the 1940s, Frank Costello was known as the Prime Minister of the Underworld owing to his gentlemanly public manner, political connections, and patina of respectability. Costello used the mob’s Prohibition-era millions—and the money from its vast illegal gambling empire—to take control of Tammany Hall. This meant that while Costello was the head of what came to be known as the Genovese crime family, he also pretty much ran the Democratic party in New York.

In 1942, when Costello’s godson, Gene Pope, wanted to buy the Enquirer—then called the Inquirer, Pope needed cash. Being a good godfather, Costello—depending on which source you believe—forked over somewhere in the range of $10,000 to $25,000. Costello also regularly fronted Pope the cash needed to keep the doors open at the struggling publication. And I do mean cash, because each week, a messenger from the tabloid came to Costello’s de facto headquarters, the Waldorf Hotel barbershop, where Costello handed over an envelope of greenbacks.

https://www.thedailybeast.com/how-the-enquirer-betrayed-a-mafia-don-and-the-donald