Trump develops a new way to take money from taxpayers to enrich himself-- and make Pence suffer
- On This Day In The Trump Administration
- Sep 1, 2024
- 2 min read
September 2: On This Day In 2019
Trump never misses an opportunity to line his own personal pockets. OTDI 2019, he took it to a new level. Mike Pence had meetings with Irish government officials in Dublin, on the east coast of Ireland. But, weirdly, he spent his overnights at Trump’s golf resort in Doonbeg on the west coast, 180 miles away.
That's like having meetings in Detroit but sleeping in Cleveland each night. Pence’s senseless extra travels cost taxpayers more than $600,000.
Why? Pence’s chief of staff later revealed that Pence stayed at Doonbeg at Trump’s “suggestion.” Why would Trump want that? Well of course it's because the U.S. government paid Trump’s hotel for everybody to stay there--not just the VP, but the staffers, the Secret Service, etc. And, for Trump, the "free” publicity his club generated from the important visitor helped enrich him even further.
The watchdog group Property of the People said Trump openly violated laws that prohibit the president from accepting government payments beyond his official salary.
By the way, Pence did a poor job representing the U.S. while he was in Ireland. As one onlooker put it, he humiliated the Brits and “shat on the carpet.”
Again, stay tuned: There’s a coda to this story too, which we’ll tell you about next month.
(One follow-up thought: Is it possible this is simply another example of Trump’s stunning stupidity? Maybe he didn’t know the island of Ireland is a wee bit wider than the island of Manhattan?)
Dive Deeper
NBC News reports on cost of Pence’s Doonbeg stay
NPR report on Watchdog Group’s assertion that Trump violated laws
Vanity Fair examines Doonbeg, and the Trump grift
The Guardian reports on Pence's "carpet shitting" in Ireland
Pic: Via Google Earth
On This Day In The Trump Administration: Trump makes Pence stay at golf club in Ireland; grift US taxpayers