What taxpayers are paying so the Obama family can enjoy a luxury Christmas vacation in Hawaii is absolutely mindblowing.
For the First Family’s 17-day trip, sources say that it’s projected to cost taxpayers nearly $8 million—about $470,000 each day, based on current prices and data from their Christmas trip last year.
While the President and his family don’t get a free vacation themselves—they’re required to pay for their own expenses—the problem is that Obama’s share of the vacation budget isn’t all that much.
The Obamas are mostly just responsible for lodging and day-to-day expenses, like any traveler would pay.
What drives up the cost so substantially is the fact that the Obamas don’t travel alone. Rather, they travel via Air Force One, along with dozens of staffers and Secret Service agents. Their employees’ long Christmas trips to Hawaii have to be paid for by the taxpayers, because they’re federal employees just doing their job.
Even more troubling, the same sources that revealed the exorbitant cost of this year’s Hawaiian vacation note that this isn’t a fluke: Obama has always spent this much on vacation.
In fact, sources estimate that, in the seven years of his presidency, Obama has spent nearly $50 million in taxpayer dollars for his seven Hawaiian vacations.
It definitely pays to be in charge. Unfortunately, taxpayers are the ones stuck paying.
