Keeping Up With the Trumps Leaves Secret Service Out of Money
Aug. 21, 2017
Keeping Up With the Trumps Leaves Secret Service Out of Money
Statement of Robert Weissman, President, Public Citizen
Note: Public reports indicate that the U.S. Secret Service has run out of funds to pay agents who protect President Donald Trump. More than 1,000 Secret Service agents have already met federally mandated caps for overtime and salary limits that were meant to last for all of 2017.
It turns out that someone is paying for the long-running product placement that is the Trump presidency: American taxpayers.
Yes, the Secret Service must protect the president and his family. But no, the president doesn’t need to spend virtually every weekend away from the White House at his branded properties.
The president, who wants to slash the budgets of agencies that protect public health by 30 percent and eliminate such vital programs as heating aid for low-income Americans, apparently has no qualms about overspending the Secret Service budget. Sad.
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