How much has the Secret Service spent on Trump family protection since 2017 broken down by year?
Executive summary
Available reporting does not provide a single, official year-by-year accounting of how much the Secret Service spent protecting members of the Trump family from 2017 onward; instead, public records and news analyses offer episodic figures — a congressional action in 2017 that added roughly $60 million to the Secret Service’s budget for Trump-related travel and protection (part of a larger $120 million package) [1] [2], a series of trip- and short-period estimates (e.g., millions for concentrated travel in early 2017) [3] [4], and targeted post‑presidency tallies such as roughly $1.7 million for six months of extended protection after Jan. 2021 and about $141,000 for the first month of that extension [5] [6]. Comprehensive annual totals by calendar year are not published in the cited sources.
1. Why a neat annual tally is not available — fragmentation of records
Reporting by major outlets and watchdogs shows the data is scattered: congressional funding decisions and appropriations mention lump-sum budget increases (about $60 million to the Secret Service within a >$120 million package in 2017) but do not translate that directly into calendar-year line items for Trump‑family protection [1] [2]. Individual trip cost analyses (GAO excerpts, media reporting) capture isolated events — e.g., $396,000 tied to specific international travel or $1.6 million for several Mar‑a‑Lago trips — rather than clean yearly totals [3] [4]. The Secret Service declines to disclose protective‑operation cost breakdowns for operational security, leaving researchers to piece together partial figures [7].
2. The clearest single appropriation: 2017 supplemental funding
Congress included more than $120 million in a 2017 spending agreement to help cover escalating costs tied to protecting the president, his family and related facilities; roughly $60 million of that was earmarked for the Secret Service to cover presidential travel and related expenses [1] [2]. Reporting (Time, NYT, Business Insider) and contemporaneous local estimates of municipal costs (police overtime) informed these figures [8] [1].
3. Episode-based cost snapshots during 2017–2019
Investigations and GAO excerpts show the Secret Service incurred substantial, trip-anchored costs early in the administration: for example, about $1.6 million for four Mar‑a‑Lago trips in Feb–Mar 2017 and roughly $390,000 protecting adult children on three international trips in Jan–Feb 2017 [4]. Media reconstructions also cited millions in the president’s first 100 days and per‑visit costs to Mar‑a‑Lago that pushed totals into the tens of millions across early months, but these are episodic estimates rather than formal annual accounts [9] [3].
4. Post-presidency extension: short-term totals are documented
When President Trump extended six months of Secret Service protection to several adult children and some aides after leaving office, the Washington Post’s spending analysis (reported by others) put the six‑month bill at about $1.7 million; CREW and related records show roughly $140,975.14 for the first 30 days of that extension [5] [6] [10]. Watchdogs note the published records omit spending at Trump properties, so the documented numbers likely understate total outlays tied to that protection period [10] [6].
5. Competing perspectives and political context
Advocates for transparency and watchdog groups argue the Trump family’s travel intensity — reported as many more protected trips than prior first families — inflated costs and sometimes routed government spending to Trump businesses (CREW, Washington Post reporting) [11] [10]. Congressional Democrats pressed the Secret Service for detailed expense data to understand strain on agency budgets [4]. The Secret Service and some officials counter that operational security prevents full disclosure of protective‑operation costs [7]. News outlets used public budgets, purchase orders and local law‑enforcement cost estimates to fill gaps, producing varied and sometimes non‑comparable figures [9] [12].
6. What reporters and watchdogs have reliably documented
- Congressional action in 2017 assigned about $60 million to the Secret Service as part of a >$120 million package to cover Trump family/related protection and site costs [1] [2].
- Specific trip analyses by GAO and media cite: ~$396,000 tied to protecting Don Jr. and Eric on some international trips and ~$1.6 million for four Mar‑a‑Lago trips in early 2017 [3] [4].
- Post‑presidential extended protection totaled ~ $1.7 million for six months and ~$141,000 for the first month, per CREW/Washington Post records [5] [6].
7. Bottom line for someone seeking year-by-year numbers
Available sources do not publish a consolidated, year‑by‑year Secret Service spend on the Trump family from 2017 onward; researchers must assemble appropriations, GAO trip reviews and watchdog FOIA releases to approximate annual sums, while accounting for gaps (Secret Service nondisclosure of operational costs and omission of spending at Trump properties) [7] [10]. If you want, I can compile an estimate table by year using the documented appropriation amounts, GAO trip figures and CREW/Washington Post data cited above, and clearly flag where extrapolation or assumptions are required (sources: [1], [3], [4], [10], [5], [1]3).