Trump Cabinet's Spending Habits
Floor Speech
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Mr. Speaker, Mr. Gallego and I both served in the Active Duty U.S. military because we believe America is an exceptional country, the best in the world. But what really bugs us is the fraud, waste, and abuse of taxpayers' funds and taxpayers' money, and the culture of corruption in this administration starts at the top with the President. So I am just going to go through some numbers--these are facts--of how much Donald Trump has wasted of taxpayers' money.
He has spent over $58 million on 95 trips to golf clubs, including Mar-a-Lago, Bedminster, and other Trump-owned properties. Every time he takes one of these trips, according to The Washington Post and Politico, it costs about $3 million, with all the staff and everyone that has to go and travel with him. In addition, $137,000 was used for golf carts for the Secret Service between January and October 2017 alone.
At least $190,000 of taxpayers' money was used for Trump brothers' business trips in the first 3 months of 2017; $17,000 for custom rugs in the Oval Office; over $12,000 on a custom conference table for the West Wing of the White House from, by the way, the same company used by President Nixon.
So this corruption starts at the top, and now you are going to see, as you go along through the Cabinet, the fraud, waste, and abuse of taxpayers' money.
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Mr. Speaker, and then we have Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke, who spent $139,000 of taxpayers' money to renovate some office doors; $39,000 for a helicopter tour of national monuments in Nevada; $12,000 on a private jet from Las Vegas, Nevada, where he spoke to a hockey team owned by a major donor, to his home in Montana; as well as a taxpayer-funded security detail that also accompanied him and his wife on their personal vacation to Greece and Turkey at considerable taxpayer expense.
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Mr. Speaker, and now we have Veterans' Affairs Secretary David Shulkin, who spent over $122,000 of taxpayer funds with his wife to go to Europe for their primary purpose of sightseeing. David Shulkin has been fired.
I shall also note that Secretary Tom Price, who was also in the Trump Cabinet, spent huge amounts of taxpayers' dollars on first-class flights. He was also fired.
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Well, there are just so many folks. The next person we have is former Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, who also was fired. He spent $12 million of taxpayers' money in fees to consultants in an attempt to downsize and restructure the State Department.
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Mr. Speaker, but wait. There is more on Scott Pruitt.
In addition to his waste of taxpayers' money, he also got a sweetheart deal from lobbyists in Washington, D.C. He was able to get a lease for just $50 a night--something you can't really get anywhere near Capitol Hill--and he only had to pay on the nights that he was there, even though the lease said that the landlord had to keep it open for 6 months--it was on demand and he could go there any time--oh, and, by the way, his daughter could also basically stay as well. When you put out the numbers, that agreement was two to three times less than what any ordinary citizen could have gotten.
This culture of corruption has now led to a Cabinet of corruption. I don't care whether you are a Republican or a Democrat or an Independent, this is just not acceptable. It is time that the American taxpayer speak out and tell the Trump administration: We have had enough. You need to start firing these officials who are wasting taxpayers' money and getting sweetheart deals for lobbyists.
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Mr. Speaker, in fact, this administration has fertilized the swamp. It is tremendously, bigly huge right now. We have lobbyists who have inappropriate deals with Cabinet officials, we have Cabinet officials spending a lot of taxpayers' money to live up their luxury lifestyle of first-class jets, of luxury hotels, and of trips they don't need to take. This is simply not acceptable. This is exactly the opposite of what the President ran on, and the voters are going to know this this November.
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Mr. Speaker, Congressman Gallego and I are writing an open letter to the American taxpayers that is going to contain all of these facts, with the sources cited, so that the American people can see for themselves the huge waste of taxpayers' money from the Cabinet of corruption.
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