Questions swirl about who paid for Don Jr., Eric, Lara and Tiffany to join president on five-day jaunt to Europe but Trumpworld insists they flew commercial and covered their own hotel bills
Questions swirl around the vast taxpayer expenses tied to Donald Trump's trip to Europe this week, as newspapers in the UK and the U.S. asked pointed questions about the five-day diplomatic journey that doubled as an occasional promotion for the president's family and one of his golf businesses.
Donald Trump Jr., Eric Trump and his wife Lara, and Tiffany Trump all participated in high-profile ceremonial events despite having no role in the government.
Ivanka Trump and her husband Jared Kushner are White House officials. The others paid their own way, according to a person with direct knowledge of the situation.
They shelled out for hotel rooms and flew commercial, leaving and returning from New York City, the source said Friday: 'The president's family members are allowed to fly on Air Force One but they chose not to, to avoid ethical complications.'
However they crossed the pond, they took their seats at Buckingham Palace for a State Banquet, sat at tables near their father's for a royal dinner in honor of Prince Charles, posed for pictures in Winston Churchill's war bunker and, in Don Jr. and Eric's case, yukked it up in Ireland to the soundtrack of camera shutters as they pulled pints of ale behind a bar.
The president's adult children and their spouses (L-R) Tiffany Trump, Lara Trump, Eric Trump, Ivanka Trump, Jared Kushner and Donald Trump Jr. all accompanied him and first lady Melania Trump to Europe this week; while Ivanka and Jared are government officials, sources say the others had to pay their own airfare and hotel bills to avoid ethics complaints
Kusher, Eric, the president and Don Jr. posed at Buckingham Palace before a State Banquet, drawing complaints from Trump opponents who saw red flags since Trump's sons have no role in the government
A former State Department foreign service officer who spoke to The Washington Post on Thursday cast doubt on the appropriateness of the government paying for any part of their travel.
'The president remains the owner of the Trump Organization, but his adult sons are running the business,' said Jeff Rathke. 'It would seem to me that this would be a classic case where an agency ethics official would have to weigh in on whether it is appropriate for the adult children's travel to be covered or require reimbursement.'
But CBS News reported Thursday that a White House official said Trump family members who are not in government service 'are personally paying.'
Public records discovered by the Scotsman newspaper show that the U.S. government inked contracts worth at least $3,512,288 for the presidential trip for hotels and transportation alone.
That doesn't include the expense of keeping a U.S. Secret Service detail working around the clock in a foreign country, or the security costs borne by the governments of the UK, France and Ireland. The newspaper estimated 'an eight-figure sum' for Britain to bear.
A former White House official said Friday that 'a bunch of ancillary costs for trips like these' would be 'a lot harder to track, and probably impossible to be fair about.'
Presidents, vice presidents, former presidents, their children, and anyone else in their households get taxpayer-funded protection by default.
The Secret Service also has the authority to watch over former presidential family members in cases like those of Jenna and Barbara Bush, who kept their protection details during their college years after their father left the White House.
It's unusual but not unprecedented for members of a 'first family' to refuse Secret Service protection. The only known cases in the past 75 years are Ron Reagan Jr., who refused the coverage during his father's second term, and Richard and Pat Nixon, who hired their own private security beginning in 1985.
Unlike Donald Trump Jr. and Eric Trump, they didn't have their own households to manage and children to look after.
Jonathan Wackrow, a 14-year Secret Serice veteran who worked on President Barack Obama's family protection team, told NPR in 2017 that there's a good reason to protect a president's children, even at great expense.
'If Eric Trump is traveling and let's say, God forbid, gets attacked and hurt, killed – imagine the impact, the psychological impact, that would have on the president,' he said.
'So by protecting the children, you're by default protecting the sanctity of the office of the presidency.'
A current Secret Service agent who protected President Trump during the 2016 campaign told DailyMail.com on Friday that 'the real threat is a kidnapping.'
'If someone grabs Don Jr. or Tiffany, now they have leverage over a U.S. president and everything that comes along with it. That's unimaginable.'
'I mean, would he have to resign to avoid being compromised?' the agent asked, while emphasizing twice that he wasn't speaking for the agency.
The person with knowledge of the adult Trump children's travel sought to downplay the cost of their Secret Service protection abroad, saying Friday that their hotel rooms at Trump International Golf Links & Hotel in Doonbeg, Ireland were billed at a rate designed not to turn a profit.
They 'charge simple cost to stay at Doonbeg and refused paying customers who would have paid 10 times their rate,' the source said.
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