John,
The Trump family took more trips that required Secret Service protection in the last fiscal year than the Obama family took in seven. That’s staggering.
Obama’s family took an average of 133 protected trips per year, while the Trump family has averaged 1,625, according to a Secret Service budget document uncovered by CREW. This 12x increase costs tens of millions of dollars, and puts a real strain on the Secret Service. Read more on CREW’s website, and then share the story on Facebook and Twitter.
Of course, the problem is not that the Trump family gets protection—they should. The problem is that much of the Trump family’s travel has been to promote the Trump business, which the president profits from, while taxpayers pick up the tab.
CREW has uncovered the costs for several Trump family business trips over the past three years to piece together the scope of the problem. First there was the trip Eric Trump and Donald Trump Jr. took to Dubai in 2017, which cost the Secret Service more than $200,000. Next there was Eric Trump’s trip to the Dominican Republic, which cost another $20,000 and then his two visits to Uruguay on Trump Organization business, costing taxpayers a total of more than $177,000.
Those are just the receipts we have obtained so far, and this new budget document suggests that there may be many more costs we don’t know about. We should not be subsidizing the president’s business.
The Trump Organization should reimburse taxpayers for all business travel we have paid for. This is not normal, and we can’t forget that.
Thank you for standing with us,
Noah Bookbinder
Executive Director, CREW
