By Hilary Russ
NEW YORK (Reuters) – A federal spending agreement reached late on Sunday will reimburse New York City for money spent securing U.S. President Donald Trump and his family at Trump Tower in Manhattan.
Altogether, New York City and other state and local governments that have hosted the president would receive $61 million in the latest federal budget deal.
Officials in Florida’s Palm Beach County, home to Trump’s private club Mar-a-Lago, have also asked for help in paying security costs.
“We are getting what we are owed,” Mayor Bill de Blasio said in a statement on Monday. “That’s good news for our city and the hardworking police officers faced with this unprecedented security challenge.”
He and Police Commissioner James O’Neill worked for several months with New York’s congressional delegation to have the funds included in the deal, he said.
Congress is expected to approve the legislation by the end of the week.
The deal includes $20 million for costs incurred between Election Day in November and Inauguration Day in January, as well as $41 million after Trump was sworn in.
The funding, which must be shared with other local governments, is on top of the $7 million allocated last fall.
The city spends on average $127,000 to $146,000 a day for the New York Police Department to protect First Lady Melania Trump and the couple’s young son when President Trump is not in town.
Those costs are expected to swell to a daily average of $308,000 when Trump is in the city, the mayor’s office said.
Their home atop the 58-story skyscraper on Fifth Avenue near Central Park is the site of regular protests and is in an area popular with tourists.
When outlining his $84.9 billion executive city budget for fiscal 2018 on Wednesday, de Blasio said the city normally handles occasional visits from Presidents, but not ongoing costs to keep the First Family secure in Trump Tower.
“We’re not budgeting for something that’s a federal responsibility,” he said, according to a transcript of his remarks.
“It is ridiculous to expect local law enforcement… to bear the extraordinary and ongoing costs of protecting the President of the United States,” Congresswoman Carolyn Maloney, who helped lead the state’s congressional delegation in making the reimbursement request, said in a statement on Monday.
(Reporting by Hilary Russ; Editing by Meredith Mazzilli)