Milbank: Trumps high life starting to add up for taxpayers
How many Americans does it take to keep President Trump and his family in the lifestyle to which they are accustomed?
Well, think of it this way. The Washington Post last week had a scoop on the Secret Service requesting an additional $60 million in its next budget: $27 million to protect the president’s wife and son at their three-floor penthouse at Trump Tower in New York, where they live instead of the White House, and $33 million for additional travel costs.
The average family of four in the United States pays about $4,000 a year in federal income taxes. That means the entire tax bill for 15,000 families for the year will go toward these additional protection measures for Trump. And the Secret Service is just a slice of the overall expense. Figure in costs incurred by authorities in Florida and New York, the Pentagon and others, and costs related to the Trump sons’ international business trips, and we’re well over $100 million a year.
That’s the annual federal income-tax bill for some 25,000 American families. Each trip Trump takes to his Mar-a-Lago club in Florida, where he has gone most weekends since his inauguration, is estimated to cost taxpayers in excess of $3 million. And an unknown chunk of the taxpayers’ money subsidizes Trump businesses in the form of rent, restaurant bills and publicity. In April, Trump will host Chinese leader Xi Jinping at what Trump dubs the “Southern White House,” which is a Trump property where the initiation fee has doubled to $200,000 since Trump won the presidency.
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Making the poor pay for luxuries for rich republicans
