Liberal Forum

Secret Service has paid rates as high as $650 a night for rooms at Trump’s properties.

President Trump’s company charges the Secret Service for the rooms agents use while protecting him at his luxury properties — billing U.S. taxpayers at rates as high as $650 per night, according to federal records and people who have seen receipts.

Those charges, compiled here for the first time, show that Trump has an unprecedented — and largely hidden — business relationship with his own government.

When Trump visits his clubs in Palm Beach, Fla., and Bedminster, N.J., the service needs space to post guards and store equipment.

Trump’s company says it charges only minimal fees. But Secret Service records do not show that.

At Trump’s Mar-a-Lago Club, the Secret Service was charged the $650 rate dozens of times in 2017, and a different rate, $396.15, dozens more times in 2018, according to documents from Trump’s visits.

And at the Trump National Golf Club Bedminster, the Secret Service was charged $17,000 a month to use a three-bedroom cottage on the property, an unusually high rent for homes in that area, according to receipts from 2017.

Trump’s company billed the government even for days when Trump wasn’t there.

These payments appear to contradict the Trump Organization’s own statements about what it charges members of his government entourage.

“If my father travels, they stay at our properties for free — meaning, like, cost for housekeeping,”

Trump’s son Eric said in a Yahoo Finance interview last year.

The full extent of the Secret Service’s payments to Trump’s company is not known.

The Secret Service has not listed them in public databases of federal spending, as is usually required for payments over $10,000.

Instead, documents have come out piecemeal, through public records requests from news organizations and watchdog groups.

The Washington Post compiled available records and found 103 payments from the Secret Service to Trump’s company dated between January 2017 and April 2018.

The records show more than $471,000 in payments from taxpayers to Trump’s companies.

But — because these records cover only a fraction of Trump’s travel during a fraction of his term — the actual total is likely to be higher.

“It is more than a little disconcerting, knowing this is going on, and not knowing what the actual numbers are,” said Jordan Libowitz, of the watchdog group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington.

“That’s kind of crazy that we know the president is benefiting from the presidency, and we do not know how.

We do not know how many taxpayer dollars are in his pocket.”

The White House did not respond to questions about Trump’s knowledge of these payments.

In a statement, the Secret Service said that its spending “balances operational security with judicious allocation of resources.”

By law, Secret Service agents are exempt from the government’s usual per diem spending limits while they are protecting the president.

The Secret Service did not respond to a question about why the purchases weren’t listed in public databases.

Trump still owns his company.

In response to questions from The Post, a company spokesperson said Mar-a-Lago does not charge the Secret Service $650 per room but did not address whether it had charged that rate in the past.

The company also noted that the rental cottage at Bedminster contains “multiple rooms and [includes] numerous common spaces.”

The company did not answer questions about the rates it charges the Secret Service now.

“We provide the rooms at cost and could make far more money renting them to members or guests,” Trump Organization Executive Vice President Eric Trump said in a statement.

He gave no details about how the company calculates the “at-cost” price.

During the 2016 campaign, Trump told voters that — if he was elected — he would not have time for travel.

“I would rarely leave the White House because there’s so much work to be done,” Trump told the Hill in a June 2015 interview.

“I would not be a president who took vacations. I would not be a president that takes time off.”

But since taking office, Trump has spent more than 342 days — a third of his entire presidency — at his private clubs and hotels, according to a tally by The Post.

Trump has said he works during these trips.

The Secret Service always comes with him, as it does with all presidents.

But the Trump Organization has assured the public that it is giving the government a great deal.

Last year, Eric Trump told Yahoo Finance that when his father does visit his properties, he is legally required to charge something.

Eric Trump did not say what law required Trump to charge his own government, and the Secret Service did not respond to questions asking what law he was referring to.

The Secret Service is part of the Department of Homeland Security, whose internal directives state, “DHS may accept gifts to carry out program functions.”

“If he stays at one of his places, the government actually . . . saves a fortune because, if they were to go to a hotel across the street, they’d be charging them $500 a night, whereas, you know we charge them, like 50 bucks,” Eric Trump said.

That appears to be wrong.

The Secret Service is required to tell Congress twice a year about what it spends to protect Trump at his properties.

But since 2016, it has only filed two of the required six reports, according to congressional offices.

The reasons, according to Secret Service officials: key personnel left and nobody picked up the job.

Even in those two reports, the lines for Bedminster and Mar-a-Lago were blank.

The Secret Service officials said only that they abide by the law, but they did not elaborate.

They are probably referring to a provision that requires them to tell Congress about “permanent” costs.

They may not consider anything they’ve done at either club permanent.

Senate Democrats have asked the Trump administration to provide more details on the costs of Trump’s travel as part of negotiations over a bill governing the Secret Service.

But Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin has told the Senate committee that he opposes a requirement to deliver those details until December 2020 at the earliest, which falls after the election.

“They’ve really stonewalled us,” said Sen. Tom Udall (D-N.M.).

“He’s trying to hide the details from the public, because he knows how bad it looks.

That’s the truth of it.

He’s a billionaire, but we’re spending millions of dollars to support his for-profit clubs and for-profit businesses.”