The White House decides how much taxpayers subsidize Trump's campaign trips on Air Force One

Trump uses Air Force One as a campaign prop

(Image credit: Drew Angerer/Getty Images)

As with all presidents of the modern era, President Trump's Air Force One flights are funded entirely by taxpayers when they are for official government business but are partially reimbursed by his campaign when they are for political travel. So who decides which trips are political and which are official, or which portion of a mixed-purpose trip the campaign has to cover, and at what cost? It's complicated, USA Today reports. And it's mostly secret.

"It's up to the White House to determine if the trip has a political purpose," Brendan Doherty, an expert on presidential travel and fundraising at the U.S. Naval Academy, tells USA Today. "We usually don't get a full picture of what that cost is." Judicial Watch's Tom Fitton called the reimbursement formula "a magic number."

The White House's formula, created during Ronald Reagan's presidency, isn't public, nor is the cost of flying Air Force One — recent Pentagon estimates puts the cost at $165,000 to $275,000 an hour. And even when a president's trip is purely political, the Federal Election Commission requires the campaign to reimburse the government for only the estimated cost of a charter flight.

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The mystery of how much taxpayers are subsidizing the political activity of sitting presidents has long frustrated open-government groups and political rivals — Trump criticized former President Barack Obama over his use of Air Force One during campaigns. But it's even murkier for a line-blurring, rally-loving president like Trump.

"The White House's calculation of travel expenses can be especially challenging when the president travels to what is intended as an official event, but then engages in impromptu partisan activity," Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) wrote White House Counsel Emmet Flood last October. "It is essential that taxpayer dollars are not used to subsidize partisan political activities." Wyden never got a reply, USA Today reports. Read more about the costs of Air Force One, and how Trump compares with Obama, at USA Today.

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Peter has worked as a news and culture writer and editor at The Week since the site's launch in 2008. He covers politics, world affairs, religion and cultural currents. His journalism career began as a copy editor at a financial newswire and has included editorial positions at The New York Times Magazine, Facts on File, and Oregon State University.