Management filling in as workers strike at Taj Mahal

ATLANTIC CITY, N.J. (AP) — Atlantic City's Trump Taj Mahal casino has pressed management into service to perform work that striking union members had done, including handling luggage at the hotel desk.

About 1,000 members of Local 54 of the Unite-HERE union began walking off the job at the Trump Taj Mahal casino at 6 a.m. Friday amid a contract dispute with owner Carl Icahn at the start of the busiest weekend of the year for the casino industry.

The Taj Mahal was the only one of the five casinos targeted by the union that couldn't reach a deal.

Hundreds of protesters are walking the picket line. A bar trailer outside the casino is succeeding in drowning out some of the union's chanting and singing by blasting hip-hop from large speakers mounted atop its roof.