President Biden’s getaways to his Delaware beach home have cost taxpayers about $3million in Secret Service alone, the service’s expense records revealed.
The record showed that Biden’s security detail spent $1.96million across the 16 trips he’s taken to Delaware in 2021 so far, according to The New York Post.
However, an additional nine trips have yet to be accounted for and are estimated to push the total to $3million.
The expensive figure reflects the president’s 25 trips in just 43 weeks in office, which equates to 77 days – expenses that far exceed the $2.4million in Secret Service costs spent to protect Donald Trump during the 99 days he spent at his golf course in Bedminster, New Jersey, during his four-year presidency.
President Biden’s getaways to his Delaware beach home have cost taxpayers about $3million in Secret Service alone, the service’s expense records revealed
Biden and First Lady Jill Biden pictured walking on the beach on Delaware on November 7, 2021, while flanked by Secret Service members
The home in Wilmington, Delaware, which Biden and Jill bought in 1996 for $350,000, is located on a four-acre plot and spans 6,850 square feet. The couple has another house in the state in Rehoboth Beach – 100miles from Wilmington
The $2.4million does not include Trump’s frequent trips to his Florida home, Mar a Lago where the then-president racked up a $13.7million taxpayer bill in just four trips in early February 2017. Trump’s golf trips are estimated to have cost the taxpayer, in total, almost $150million
Biden’s documented expenses accounted for hotels and rental cars for Secret Service agents, plus airfare and train tickets for them to reach Delaware.
Yet the true cost to taxpayers is even higher because the Pentagon has yet to reveal Biden’s transportation expenses.
In 2020, the mission reimbursable rate for Air Force One, including fuel, flight consumables, aircraft overhaul and engine overhaul, cost a staggering $176,393 per hour,
‘What they may not realize is that they’re paying insane amounts of money for him to be tucked into bed in Delaware every weekend.’
However, although Trump’s Secret Service tab was less than Biden’s, the ex-president’s costs soared for other agencies.
The four times Trump stayed at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida in early 2017 cost taxpayers $13.6million – $10.6million of which was spent on official aircrafts and boats, according to The Post.
Each Trump trip set the Coast Guard back about $1million.
Meanwhile, Tom Fitton, the President of Judicial Watch, which acquired the expense records under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), noted that ‘the costs of presidential travel and security is of obvious public interest’.
The true cost to taxpayers is even higher than the estimated sum because the Pentagon has yet to reveal Biden’s transportation expenses. It’s still unclear how much Air Force One and Marine One helicopter trips have cost (pictured in Delaware in June 2021)
Secret Security members were seen keeping a watchful eye on Biden while he visited Rehoboth Beach, which he has gone to three times out of the 25 trips he’s taken to Delaware since becoming president
Biden was pictured leaving St Joseph on the Brandywine Catholic Church in Wilmington with three of his grandchildren after attending mass (L-R: Hunter, Finnegan, Natalie)
But he also recognized that they’re incomplete. ‘It is frustrating that after years of litigation through two presidential administrations, the Secret Service and Air Force are still stonewalling the costs of presidential travel,’ Fitton said.
Biden has visited his home in Wilmington, Delaware, 22 times and his Rehoboth Beach house – 100miles from Wilmington – three times, where the president, First Lady Jill Biden and their German Shepherd Major are often pictured bike riding or walking along the beach.
The White House has refused to release visitor log information for Biden’s Delaware homes although he is said to have recently hosted Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer of New Jersey and Senator Joe Manchin of West Virginia for legislative talks in Wilmington.
He has also been to Camp David in Maryland for 11 weekend getaways.
But Greg Jenkins, director of White House advance planning under President George W Bush, doesn’t think Biden’s time away from Washington is such a bad thing.
‘For my money, the more a president gets some time to himself or herself, the better. It’s not like the country isn’t being tended to or he’s taking his eye off the ball because he’s changed locations,’ he told The Post.
‘I guess it really gets down to, is the president paying attention to what they need to be paying attention to when they’re away from the White House? And I have no reason to believe President Biden is not paying attention to what he needs to pay attention to.’
But apparently it’s not just the travel and security that costing so much money. The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) revealed last month that it is spending nearly $500,000 to build a fence around Biden’s Wilmington home.
Biden’s expenses far exceed the $2.4million in Secret Service costs spent to protect Donald Trump during the 99 days he spent at his golf course in Bedminster, New Jersey, during his four-year presidency (pictured at Trump National golf Course in Bedminster in 2017)
Ex-president Trump pictured at his Bedminster, New Jersey, golf club alongside Hall of Fame quarterback Brett Favre in June 2020
The news came after Biden said he refuses to finish Trump’s border wall while illegal immigration reaches record highs since at least 1960. Figures from the US government revealed 1.7million migrants were apprehended in the 12-month period, which ended on September 30.
The home, which Biden and Jill bought in 1996 for $350,000, is located on a four-acre plot and spans 6,850 square feet.
Yet Biden’s trips to the vacation home have been ongoing despite his focus on global warming, which he has called a ‘climate crisis’ that threatens the world’s future, as reported by The Post.
Extinction Rebellion, an anti-climate change activist group, noted the ‘hypocrisy’ of elected officials isn’t their top priority.
Oddly enough, the activist group was okay with that and instead said: ‘We need to stop fixating on the hypocrisy of individuals lifestyle choices and focus on the systemic changes that are now necessary to protect our civilization from collapse.’
The group continued and told The Post: ‘President Biden’s personal carbon footprint pales in comparison to the choices he makes in office as the leader of one of the highest emitting nations in the world, not least the decision to hold the largest oil and gas lease sale in US history after promising on the campaign trail to “take on the fossil fuel industry.”‘