Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner forbade the Secret Service agents assigned to protect them from using any of the 6.5 bathrooms in their Washington, D.C., home, forcing them instead to rent a $3,000-per-month apartment at the taxpayers’ expense, a new report claims.
The Washington Post (via Business Insider ) reported that the couple barred agents from using the bathrooms when they moved into a mansion in the nation’s capital. The report claimed that they initially used a port-a-potty stationed on a sidewalk. After neighbors complained about the portable bathroom stationed in public, they began using one in the garage of former President Barack Obama nearby. The federal government then began renting a studio apartment across the street from where Trump and Kushner lived, starting in September 2017.
As noted, close to $100,000 in taxpayer money has been spent on the apartment, with another $44,000 expected to be spent before the lease expires at the end of September. The Trump family has long come under scrutiny for the taxpayer funds gone toward their accommodations, with critics pointing to President Donald Trump’s frequent trips to his company’s properties as well as his golf trips.
As The Inquisitr reported, an analysis found that the president had already racked up more than $118 million in public-funded costs for his golf outings through the end of 2019. The analysis from HuffPost alleged that Trump, who bragged that he would not accept a salary and donated his paychecks, had spent the equivalent of 296 years of his $400,000 salary through these trips.
“And of that $118.3 million, at least several million has gone into Trump’s own cash registers, as Secret Service agents, White House staff and other administration officials stay and eat at his hotels and golf courses,” the outlet noted, adding that it had been difficult to pin down an exact total because the White House had been tight-lipped about when he was golfing.
Ivanka Trump has faced a different kind of scrutiny in the last week. In the hours after a large number of her father’s supporters stormed the U.S. Capitol, she sent a tweet calling on them to halt the attack and stay peaceful, but referred to the attackers as “American Patriots.” The tweet was later deleted, but not before it sparked controversy and criticism for her apparent praise of those taking part in the siege.
House spokesman Judd Deere told The Washington Post that Kushner and Trump had never prohibited Secret Service members from using the bathrooms in their home.