A political scandal is growing in North Carolina’s Cleveland County over the Catawba Nation’s Two Kings Casino in Kings Mountain. According to a report in the Charlotte Observer, Cleveland County officials reaped “comparatively huge sums of money” in campaign contributions from people with business ties to the casino, which opened in 2021.
The latest report centers on Cleveland County Commissioner Eddie Holbrook. According to the report, in each of the first three quarters of 2018, Holbrook raised more money than his competitors did over the entire year—some $64,570. The newspaper cited Holbrook’s financial ties to the Catawba casino in Kings Mountain, with the majority of the money his campaign raised in 2018 coming from people who either have business ties to the casino, which Holbrook supported for years before it opened in 2021, or to companies benefiting from the casino.
Holbrook’s campaign received $33,000 in donations from only four people, three that have financial stakes in companies related to the casino and a relative of one of those three associates, according to the Observer.
County businessmen Doug Brown and Stuart LeGrand, along with LeGrand’s daughter, gave nearly $23,000 to Holbrook’s campaign in 2018, campaign finance reports show. Wallace Cheves, the man hired by Catawba Nation to help them get Two Kings Casino, also donated $10,200 to the campaign. Neither donated to any other candidates, and Holbrook maintained his strong support for the project.
Holbrook also held a financial stake in the casino, the Observer reported in August. Through a company he created with his wife, called Moose & Putter Butter, LLC, Holbrook owned a small piece of a company called Kings Mountain Equipment Supply, which is contracted to provide slot machines to the casino.
