Trump’s inauguration cost roughly twice as much as his predecessors

WASHINGTON, 16 Jan. - (ANA)  — Private donors put up $107 million to usher Donald Trump into office in style two years ago, and it is now clear just how enthusiastically his inaugural committee went to town with it, according to the New York Times.

There was $10,000 for makeup for 20 aides at an evening inaugural event. There was another $30,000 in per diem payments to dozens of contract staff members, in addition to their fully covered hotel rooms, room service orders, plane tickets and taxi rides, including some to drop off laundry.

The bill from the Trump International Hotel was more than $1.5 million. And there was a documentary, overseen by a close friend of Melania Trump’s, that was ultimately abandoned.

The details of the expenditures, gleaned from interviews and from documents reviewed by The New York Times and not previously made public, show that the committee spent heavily on nearly every aspect of the events surrounding the inauguration.


In 72 days, it laid out about $100 million, roughly twice as much or more than was raised by Barack Obama or George W. Bush for their first and second presidential inaugurations.

The expansive spending reflected Mr. Trump’s desire to make a grand entrance, with roughly 20 events around Washington, people familiar with the events said. It also had the hallmarks of previous Trump efforts, such as the campaign, with some Trump-family friends circumventing existing chains of command.

Disclosure of the spending details comes at a time when the inaugural committee is facing legal scrutiny over the donations that funded it.

Inaugural committees are required to document every donation with the Federal Election Commission, and the Trump team’s reports are now under investigation by federal prosecutors in Manhattan and Brooklyn. Investigators are also looking into whether any foreign donations, which are illegal in the United States, were passed through Americans, and whether any donations went unrecorded, people familiar with the inquiries said.  - (ANA) -

AB/ANA/ 16 January 2019 - - -