The Secret Service is spending big at President Donald Trump’s properties, forcing taxpayers to foot the bill.
According to invoices obtained by the Washington Post and its unnamed sources, the Trump Organization charged the President’s security detail $650 per night in 2017 for their stays at Mar-A-Lago dozens of times.
In the same year, Trump’s company also charged Secret Service a rate of $17,000 a month when agents stayed at a cottage merely consisting of three bedrooms at Trump National Golf Club Bedminster in New Jersey.
In 2018, Mar-A-Lago’s nightly rates dropped to $396 for the Secret Service, but the Post noted that agents had longer stays and used more rooms that year.
Sometimes there were days when President wasn’t even at the luxury properties the Secret Service had booked. Those properties charged the government full price anyway.
Trump’s use of his presidency to promote or pour money into his businesses has been a persistent issue, whether he’s making unnecessary stops at his golf clubs while traveling (and having Vice President Mike Pence do the same) or insisting that his resort host the G-7 summit.
