Billions made Adelsons political VIPs

Sheldon Adelson and Dr Miriam Adelson (center) at the April 2012 opening of Sands Cotai Central with then Macau Chief Executive Fernando Chui Sai-on (left) and then Las Vegas Sands president and COO Michael Leven.

My retrospective on Las Vegas Sands founder Sheldon Adelson, who died last month, has been published in the February issue of Inside Asian Gaming. It’s accompanied by a look at how Adelson and his wife, born Miriam Farbstein in Tel Aviv in 1945, used their billions to change the course of politics in Israel and the United States. Dr Miriam Adelson received the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2018 from Donald Trump for her work combating substance abuse and support for Jewish causes, after the couple gave more than $100 million to support Trump and his agenda.

As forecast here, new chairman and CEO Rob Goldstein announced on the company’s earnings call on January 27 that LVS is exploring online gaming.

Former US diplomat and broadcast news producer Muhammad Cohen is a contributor to Forbes and Inside Asian Gaming, columnist/correspondent for Asia Times, and author of Hong Kong On Air, a novel set in his adopted hometown during the 1997 handover about television news, love, betrayal, high finance, and cheap lingerie. See his bio, online archive and more at www.muhammadcohen.com; follow him on Facebook and Twitter @MuhammadCohen.