Ivanka Trump, Donald Trump Jr and Eric Trump – three of ex-US president Donald Trump’s adult children – continue to land taxpayers with the cost of their Secret Service protection.
They racked up more than $140,000 in charges in the first month following new president Joe Biden’s inauguration on January 20, according to watchdog group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, which analysed Secret Service spending records obtained under the Freedom of Information Act.
Agents protecting Trump’s progeny spent $52,296.75 on travel and $88,678.39 on hotel costs during the 30-day period, including on trips to Salt Lake City, Miami and New York, the group said Wednesday.
It works out to around $4,699 per day.
And the total costs to taxpayers could be even higher, because the Secret Service “did not provide records of spending at Trump businesses, which is the most controversial aspect of the extended protection”, CREW added.
Remember how we were investigating how much Trump’s children’s extended Secret Service protection would cost taxpayers? We got an answer: over $140K in just 30 days after Trump left office, and there’s likely more we don’t know about. https://t.co/WFKuVg16kw
— Citizens for Ethics (@CREWcrew) May 6, 2021
That the Trump offspring can benefit from publicly-funded security details at all is down to their father’s six-month extension of their protection following his departure from the White House.
Only the ex-president, former first lady Melania Trump and their son Barron, 15, are entitled to automatic protection.
Trump, however, extended the perk to his aforementioned kids (plus youngest daughter Tiffany Trump) and their partners in the final days of his administration.
“While it may be tempting to put the story of the Trump family’s profiteering in the past, we cannot until they have actually stopped directing taxpayer money into their own bank accounts,” said the group, which has long exposed instances of taxpayer money being funneled to Trump properties. “Thanks to Trump’s unusual extension of their protection, they’ve got a few more months to continue the grift.”
