8 Jan 2020 8:17 pm
The Trump administration is seeking to delay a Democratic effort to require the Secret Service to disclose how much it spends protecting President Trump and his family when they travel — until after the 2020 election, according to people familiar with the discussions.
The issue has emerged as a sticking point in recent weeks as Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin and key senators have been negotiating draft legislation to move the Secret Service back to his department, its historic home.
Mnuchin has balked at Democratic demands that the bill require the Secret Service to disclose the costs related to the travel of the president and his adult children within 120 days after it is passed, according to people with knowledge of the talks.
Mnuchin has agreed to Democrats’ push for a requirement that the Secret Service report its travel expenses but wants such disclosures to begin after the election.
In a statement, the Treasury Department confirmed that Mnuchin has been working with Secret Service Director James Murray and congressional committees on a bill to transfer the Secret Service from the Department of Homeland Security to Treasury, but did not address the dispute about the reporting requirement.
“Conversations about the return of the Secret Service to the Treasury Department are ongoing, and we decline to comment on individual aspects of those conversations,” said a Treasury official, who like others spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the ongoing negotiations.
The administration’s resistance to disclosing how much taxpayer money has been spent on presidential travel has drawn criticism from Democrats, who say the public has a right to know the price of his frequent visits to his resorts in Florida and New Jersey.
During the 2016 campaign, Trump promised to “rarely leave the White House” and cut back on what he called wasteful travel by his predecessor, Barack Obama.
Since taking office, however, Trump has made more than 50 visits to his properties outside the Washington area, according to a tally kept by The Washington Post.
The government spent about $96 million on travel by Obama over eight years, according to documents obtained by the conservative group Judicial Watch.
A report by the Government Accountability Office, which serves as the congressional watchdog on federal spending, estimated that Trump’s travel cost $13.6 million in just one month in early 2017.
That total included the costs of travel for Secret Service and Defense Department personnel, and the costs of renting space and operating equipment such as boats and planes.
If spending continued at that pace, Trump would have exceeded Obama’s total expenses before the end of his first year in office.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics ... NCMpDk0Xtc