Critics have long accused Donald Trump of using his presidency to maximize profits. Now, statements by the Secret Service indicate that agents had to pay inflated prices in Trump's hotels to protect the prime minister.
Former US President Donald Trump's company is said to have billed Secret Service employees for hotel stays significantly higher than officially approved during his tenure. For security guards to stay overnight in Trump hotels to protect the president and his family, the amounts paid were up to five times higher than the rate allowed by the government in such cases. This was announced by the chair of the relevant committee in the US Congress, Carolyn Maloney, to the Director of the Secret Service, Kimberly Cheatle, in a letter. She asked Cheatle to provide the committee with full accounting on the matter.
Expense reports show that the Trump Organization charged the Secret Service far higher amounts than usual on 40 occasions -- in one instance, about $1,185 for an overnight stay at Trump's International Hotel in Washington, DC. This could have cost US taxpayers at least $1.4 million. Maloney wrote that the "exorbitant rates" and the agents' "frequent visits to Trump-owned properties" raise serious concerns that Trump may have been self-serving.
The records contradict repeated claims by Eric Trump, son of the ex-president and vice president of the Trump Organization, that the family business often provided Secret Service agents with hotel rooms "at cost" or sometimes free of charge. Eric Trump claimed the security team was given huge discounts when they stayed at Trump properties. The Secret Service has not yet responded to the Washington Post report on the new congressional paper.
"Given long-standing concerns about the former President's conflicts of interest and his efforts to cash in on the presidency, the committee has a strong interest in obtaining a full accounting of federal government spending on Trump properties," Maloney continued. A law is under consideration to prevent future presidents from "exercising undue influence on the spending of the secret service".
