The Secret Service spent more than $250,000 at President Donald Trump’s properties over a five-month period in 2017, according to newly released records.
A Freedom of Information Act request filed by the Property of the People, a nonprofit watchdog group, returned documents that showed $250,020.94 in credit card purchases at Trump’s properties and businesses between Jan. 27, 2017, and June 29, 2017.
Most of the expenditures that took place during the time period were at Trump’s golf clubs, while the Secret Service spent more than $45,000 at Trump Hotel in Las Vegas in March 2017, according to the documents.
The agency spent another total of more than $32,000 at Trump International Hotel in Washington, D.C., the documents show.
Multiple $10,000 charges went through on the same day, with Politico noting that since Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida reportedly can’t process individual charges over $10,000, it’s likely that that’s where most of these expenditures took place.
Multiple lawsuits have alleged Trump is in violation of the Emoluments Clause of the Constitution, which prohibits elected officials from receiving gifts or benefits from foreign governments without Congress’s approval.
Reports earlier this year revealed the U.S. Air Force was spending money at Trump’s Turnberry resort in Scotland and that crews had been sent there up to 40 times in 2015. Around the same time, Vice President Pence raised eyebrows when he stayed at the president’s Doonbeg hotel in Ireland.
Trump has also faced backlash for his since-reversed plan to host the Group of Seven summit at his Doral property. He has dismissed the Emoluments Clause as “phony.”
