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Atlantic City unions clash in court over anti-smoking lawsuit targeting casinos

New Jersey’s attorney general and Atlantic City’s main casino workers union are seeking to dismiss a lawsuit.
The lawsuit aims to ban smoking in Atlantic City’s nine casinos.
The smoking ban debate extends beyond Atlantic City to other states where workers raise concerns about secondhand smoke.

Atlantic City’s main casino workers union and the New Jersey attorney general on Monday asked a judge to dismiss a lawsuit brought by a different union that seeks to ban smoking at the city’s nine casinos.

Local 54 of the Unite Here union said in a filing in state Superior Court that a third of the 10,000 workers it represents would be at risk of losing their jobs and the means to support their families if smoking were banned.
Currently, smoking is allowed on 25% of the casino floor. But those areas are not contiguous, and the practical effect is that secondhand smoke is present in varying degrees throughout the casino floor.

ATLANTIC CITY CASINO SMOKING BAN ADVANCES IN NEW JERSEY LEGISLATURE

A lawsuit brought earlier this month by the United Auto Workers, which represents dealers at the Bally’s, Caesars and Tropicana casinos, seeks to overturn New Jersey’s indoor smoking law, which bans it in virtually every workplace except casinos.

New Jersey’s attorney gen[…]