How Trump's company charged the U.S. government more than $900,000
Trump managed to grift the United States government for nearly a million bucks. This is quite an amazing report by The Washington Post's David Fahrenthold, Josh Dawsey, and Joshua Partlow, with all the receipts.
Trump has now visited his own properties 270 times as president, they report at the Washington Post — "with another visit planned for Thursday, when he is scheduled to meet GOP donors at his Washington hotel."
Through these trips, Trump has brought the Trump Organization a stream of private revenue from federal agencies and GOP campaign groups. Federal spending records show that taxpayers have paid Trump's businesses more than $900,000 since he took office. At least $570,000 came as a result of the president's travel, according to a Post analysis.
Now, new federal spending documents obtained by The Post via a public-records lawsuit give more detail about how the Trump Organization charged the Secret Service — a kind of captive customer, required to follow Trump everywhere. In addition to the rentals at Mar-a-Lago, the documents show that the Trump Organization charged daily "resort fees" to Secret Service agents guarding Vice President Pence in Las Vegas and in another instance asked agents to pay a $1,300 "furniture removal charge" during a presidential visit to a Trump resort in Scotland.
In addition, campaign finance records have provided new details about the payments the Trump Organization received from GOP groups, as a result of the 37 instances in which Trump headlined a political event at one of his properties. Those visits have brought the company at least $3.8 million in fees, according to a Post analysis of campaign spending records.
Read more at the Post.