Trump’s Golf Trips Could Cost Taxpayers Over $340 Million

When he was campaigning President Trump frequently bashed President Obama for playing golf and said that he would be too busy to play. Per a HuffPost article he said, “I love golf, but if I were in the White House, I don’t think I’d ever see Turnberry again. I don’t think I’d ever see Doral again,” he told a rally audience in February 2016, referring to his course near the Miami airport. “I don’t ever think I’d see anything. I just want to stay in the White House and work my ass off.”

It took less than two weeks before he broke that promise vs. Obama not playing his first round until he had been in office for about three months and Obama didn’t visit a course outside of the DC area until August 2009, seven months after his inauguration. One reason Trump has been able to play so much golf is that he inherited an economy that was in very good shape vs. Obama taking office in the teeth of the Great Recession.

As can be seen in the chart below from trumpgolfcount.com, Trump has played at least 88 rounds of golf since he became President, has likely played 139 and has visited golf courses over 193 days. These compare to Obama’s 76 outings over the same timeframe.

Trump’s golf trips have almost exclusively been to his properties. Below is a breakdown of Trump’s visits.

At his current pace Trump will visit his golf properties about 310 times and if he is re-elected it would 620.

So far Trump’s golf trips have cost at least $105 million

Trump’s trips to his golf courses are very expensive and much more than Obama’s since Trump’s have been more frequent and usually requires Air Force One and all the accompanying security arraignments.

From a combination of an analysis from the HuffPost, the GAO or General Accounting Office, Politico and the Washington Post using costs from both Obama and Trump golf trips the estimated cost of Trump’s visits so far come to a range of $105 to $108 million. When you extrapolate the $105 million estimate to eight years, assuming Trump is re-elected, the total cost is over $340 million.

The GAO report estimated that just four of Trump’s trips to Mar-a-Lago cost:

To put $340 million into perspective it is:

Source: Forbes.com

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