The "former guy" who stained the Oval Office during his corrupt and autocratic four years gets Secret Service protection, as his predecessors do. Currently residing at his tacky, nouveau riche golf club Merde o' Lardo (but expected to decamp to his Bedminster property soon), con artist Donald "Loser" Trump has found yet another way to skim a buck off of the taxpayer, to wit:
"Former president Donald Trump charged the Secret Service more than $40,000 this spring for rooms that Trump’s own protective detail used while guarding him at his Mar-a-Lago Club, according to federal spending records.
The records show that Trump’s club charged the Secret Service $396.15 every night starting Jan. 20, the day he left the White House and moved full-time into his Palm Beach, Fla., club.
Those charges, ultimately paid by taxpayers, continued until at least April 30, the spending records show, for a total of $40,011.15. The charges were for a single room used as a workspace by Secret Service agents, according to one person familiar with the payments." (our emphasis)
More than $40,000 over four months. (For comparison, according to Secret Service records, when he was Vice President, President Biden's Secret Service detail rented a small cottage at his home in Wilmington, DE from 2011 to 2017 for a six-year total of $171, 600). Trump's gouging should come as no surprise, as he looked to pocket taxpayer money from day one. This WaPo story is from last October details those costs to the taxpayer:
"President Trump has visited his own properties more than 280 times since he took office — hosting summits at his Mar-a-Lago Club in Florida, taking summer breaks at his club in Bedminster, N.J., and pausing international trips to visit his golf resorts in Scotland and Ireland.
These visits brought the president to familiar places, full of friends, family and political supporters.
They also brought his company money, from American taxpayers.
The Washington Post has obtained federal spending records showing that — while Trump was visiting his properties — his company was benefiting from payments from the U.S. government.
The total: at least $2.5 million in taxpayer funds. Much of that spending was triggered by Trump’s travel, or the travel of his family and aides." (our emphasis)
He's incapable of shame, especially when it comes to personal profit. This is the same con man that stole money from his own charity for his own purposes, and operated the fraudulent "Trump University," for which he had to reimburse $25 million in fees to victims of his scam. So, while outrageous, this latest story fits a pattern that we've become all too familiar with.
