title:  Taxpayers To Get HUGE Bill For Protecting Trump Because New York City Can’t Afford It
text: Manhattan is seeing significant problems due to Trump s insistence on staying in Trump Tower during his transition. He needs protection. His family needs protection. The tower needs protection. New York City is willing to give extensive help to the Secret Service to do it, but they can t afford it. And Mayor Bill DeBlasio is now asking the federal government for help.That help could be to the tune of $35 million, in addition to the ongoing costs of protecting Melania and Barron through the end of the school year, and the costs of Trump s need to go back to his tacky gilded penthouse as many weekends as he can. Thus far, the costs of protecting him in that tower are around $1 million per day.Now, sure, President Obama, Michelle and their daughters needed protection when they were in Chicago, Hawaii, etc. However, they didn t go back to Chicago or Hawaii nearly every weekend, and Obama took significantly fewer vacation days than George W. Bush.Trump is one of the people who got on Obama s case for the taxpayer cost of travels. He claimed that one of Obama s trips to New York City cost between $25 million and $50 million. Politifact rated that statement  Pants on Fire,  because the actual cost was considerably lower, and Trump, true to form, had no basis for his outlandish claim.McClatchy went after Obama for the price tag of his vacations, which was supposedly upwards of $70 million. Their number came from the right-wing group Judicial Watch. However, that report was published in Dec. 2015, and that cost was over the course of 7 years (it s important to note that the Obamas themselves paid for all their housing while they were away).In seven years, the Obamas cost us roughly twice what Trump is going to cost us over the next six weeks by insisting he remain in his poor man s idea of a rich man s apartment through his transition.Trump has pledged no long vacations. He doesn t count weekends in New York City or even at Mar a Lago, his Palm Beach resort, as vacations obviously, but those will add up pretty quickly in terms of taxpayer costs. A $35 million price tag just between now and January 20? Ridiculous.Featured image by Drew Angerer via Getty Images