Trump Skips Return Of Dead U.S. Soldiers To Play Golf And Boost His Business Instead

WASHINGTON – President Donald Trump skipped the return of the remains of four soldiers who died in a training exercise to Dover Air Force Base on Friday and instead spent millions of taxpayer dollars to attend a dinner for one of his business interests and to play golf.

The bodies of the four members of the Army’s 3rd Infantry Division — Sgt. Jose Duenez Jr., 25, of Joliet, Illinois; Sgt. Edvin F. Franco, 25, of Glendale, California; Staff Sgt. Troy S. Knutson-Collins, 28, of Battle Creek, Michigan; and Pfc. Dante D. Taitano, 21, of Dededo, Guam ― were returned to Delaware for their “dignified transfer” ceremony Friday morning. They died when their 70-ton armored M88 towing vehicle sank in a bog in Lithuania last week.

While the ceremony took place on the Air Force base tarmac, Trump was 900 miles south at his golf course in West Palm Beach, Florida, across the Intracoastal Waterway from his Palm Beach country club.

A Trump administration official, on condition of anonymity, said that “the families requested no media at the transfer” and that the “White House is respecting their request for privacy today and has been working on correspondence to the families.”

However, presidents in the past have attended dignified transfers while their accompanying press pools have been held in a location away from the ceremony. The White House did not respond to a query about why that did not happen in this case.

While Trump typically goes to Florida for his $3.4 million golf weekends on Fridays, he traveled a day early this week to attend a closed-door dinner at his Doral golf resort for the Saudi LIV tour, one of his business partners that holds events at his courses.

This trip, though, will cost taxpayers at least $4.2 million because of the detour to Miami International Airport, which is located just two miles east of Trump’s Doral resort. Trump nevertheless took a Marine helicopter to fly to the golf course and back rather than ride in his motorcade.

Friday was Trump’s 16th day of golf at the West Palm course and his 20th day at one of his courses since taking office Jan. 20, meaning that as of Friday, he has played golf on 27% of his days in office in his second term. The total cost to taxpayers for transporting him and his security apparatus to and from those venues these past 11 weeks is now $30.4 million, according to a HuffPost analysis.

Trump, who under the Constitution’s “emoluments clause” is not permitted to accept payments except for his official salary, has nevertheless been using his official position to help the LIV tour. In February, days after returning to office, he hosted the head of the Professional Golf Association in the Oval Office, from where he participated on a conference call with the head of the LIV tour. Trump has been open about trying to get the two rival golf organizations to merge, which, if it happens, would boost LIV and therefore himself.

LIV has since its inception used Trump’s courses for its tournaments and is holding its fourth such tournament at Doral this weekend. The Trump Organization, the umbrella company for Trump’s various business interests, did not respond to HuffPost queries about how much LIV has paid for the use of the golf courses.

That Trump would put his personal finances and his golf hobby ahead of honoring U.S. service members, while unusual for a president, is in character with his previous treatment of the military. Trump famously refused to go out in the rain for a ceremony honoring U.S. Marines who died in WWI during the 100-year anniversary of Armistice Day in France. His own chief of staff at the time confirmed that Trump called service members who died for the United States “suckers” and “losers.”