Donald Trump Jr., the eldest son of US President Donald Trump and his grandson went on a hunting trip to Mongolia in 2019 and it cost US taxpayers over $75,000.
Using taxpayer's money
According to the Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington or CREW, Donald Trump Jr. traveled to Mongolia to hunt and he shot a rare mountain sheep. Most of the taxpayer's money goes to their Secret Service protection and the Trump family takes 12 times as many trips as the Obamas.
The CREW also reported that the Trump family drains the finances of the Secret Service because they have an average of 1,000 trips for the year, and many of those trips are for leisure.
The author of the report concluded that Donald Trump Jr.'s trip to Mongolia is just one example of the expenses that the Trump family is incurring with the taxpayer's money.
The fact that one hunting trip of Donald Trump Jr's already cost about $75,000, imagine how much taxpayer's money was used on their thousands of trips per year. An employee of Donald Trump Jr. told CNN that the trip that he took in August 2019 for eight days was privately paid for except for his security detail.
Trump Jr. can use the Secret Service for his protection, but it is not required. The CREW also reported that Donald Trump Jr. is entitled to Secret Service protection because he is the son of the president and that he should be protected too.
However, American taxpayers deserve to know how much of their money is being used to facilitate his hunting trips and meetings with foreign leaders and political donors.
According to an investigation done by ProPublica in 2019, Trump Jr. shot a rare Argali mountain sheep and he only secured hunting permission from the Mongolian government. ProPublica also showed evidence that Trump Jr. was with a Republican donor who works in the gas and oil industry when he went hunting.
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The Argali sheep is a rare specie and it is famous for its longhorns. According to the Red List of Threatened Species, it is considered as near-threatened. Aside from hunting, Trump Jr. also met with Mongolian President Khaltmaagiin Battulga, just a month after President Donald Trump met President Battulga at the White House.
During the hunting trip, Trump Jr. posted pictures of himself while horseback riding. He also posted a picture of him and his son outside a traditional yurt and praised Mongolia's pristine land.
According to CREW, the exact cost of the whole trip was $76,859.36 after two Freedom of Information Act requests were submitted to the Secret Service.
The cost of Trump's trips
CREW says that the first document that was provided to them claimed that Trump Jr.'s trip only cost $17,000. The group called it an undercount because it did not include the flight costs or the meeting of Trump Jr. with the president of Mongolia.
The second document added $60,000 to the cost to American taxpayers, and the group stated that they are still investigating other aspects of the hunting trip such as whether the US Department of Interior granted a permit to bring the sheep that he shot back to America or the US State Department was involved in the trip.
Donald Trump Jr. does not hold any official government position, unlike his sister Ivanka Trump and his brother-in-law Jared Kushner.
