Golfing - Trump Versus Obama in Numbers and Costs

This will begin with an article from CNN's Fact Check, followed by my on-line research regarding numbers and costs...

Source:  CNN - Politics - Facts First -Written by Daniel Dale and Holmes Lybrand; updated 7:17 pm EDT, Monday, 25 May 2020

"Fact Check:  Trump Has Spent Far More Time at Golf Clubs Than Obama Had at Same Point

   Criticized for golfing twice on a Memorial Day Weekend during which the coronavirus death toll approached 100,00, President Donald Trump responded Sunday and Monday by drawing attention, again, to former President Barack Obama's golfing.
   Trump denounced the media, which he called "sick with hatred and dishonesty," for supposedly failing to mention that Saturday was his first time golfing in three months.  (CNN, among other outlets, did note that it was his first golf outing since March 8.)  Trump also accused the media of failing to talk about "all of the time Obama spent on the golf course, often flying to Hawaii in a big, fully loaded 747, to play.  What did that do to the so-called Carbon Footprint?"
   "Barack was always playing golf," he said in one of his five golf-related tweets.
Facts First:  Trump has spent much more time playing golf than Obama did through this point of the term - after repeatedly attacking Obama's golfing and claiming he would not play if he got elected himself.  Just Trump's airplane trips to his Mar-a-Lago Club and residence in Florida, from which he has often taken a motorcade ride to a nearby golf course he owns, have required far more air travel than Obama's once-a-year Hawaii vacations did through this point in the term.
          Obama vs. Trump: Golf by the numbers
   Obama played 98 rounds of golf through this point in his presidency, according to data provided to CNN by Mark Knoller, a veteran CBS News White House correspondent who is known for tracking presidential activities.  By contrast, Knoller said, Trump has spent all or part of 248 days at a golf course.
   CNN's own count has Trump at 266 days spending some time at a Trump golf course.
   Since Trump and his aides often refuse to confirm that he actually played golf during a visit to a golf club, even when he has been spotted in golf attire, it is not possible to definitely say how many times Trump has golfed as President.  And some of Trump's rounds, like when he plays with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, mix leisure with official business.
   Regardless, it is clear that Trump has spent more time golfing than Obama.  And Trump's own golf-related "carbon footprint" has been bigger than Obama's even if you count only air travel.
   Through this point in his first presidential term, Obama had made three vacation trips to his birth state of Hawaii for a total of 29,978 miles in the air, Knoller tweeted, while Trump has made 30 trips to Palm Beach, Florida, the home of Mar-a-Lago, for a total of 51,540 miles.
   Obama played 333 rounds during his eight years as president, according to Knoller.  In other words, Obama played golf once every 8.77 days as president.  Trump, conversely, has been at a golf club once every 4.92 days so far.
   It's also worth noting that Trump's trips - like his Saturday and Sunday visits to the Trump National Golf Club in Sterling, Virginia - have almost exclusively been to resort properties and golf courses his company owns.
   In addition to the promotional value of these trips by a president, Trump's company has generated hundreds of thousands of dollars in revenue from charges to the Secret Service, according to Washington Post reporting.
           Trump's history of criticizing Obama's golfing
   Trump, now lashing out against criticism of his own golfing, was a vocal critic of Obama's golfing.  He promised that  he would be different as president.
   "I don't have time for that.  I love golf.  I think it's one of the greats.  But I don't  have time.  Two-hundred-fifty rounds - that's more than a guy who plays on the PGA Tour plays.  He palyed more golf last year than Tiger Woods," Trump said at a December 2015 campaign rally.  "No, think of it.  We don't have time for this.  We don't have time for this.  We have to work.  We have to work, OK?"
   Trump said at an August 2016 campaign rally that he may never see his properties again if he was elected, explaining, "Because I'm going to be working for you, I'm not going to have time to go play golf."  And in an October 2016 speech, Trump said Obama's struggles to pass legislation were a result of excessive golfing.
   "Everything's executive order because he doesn't have enough time because he's playing so much golf.  He doesn't have enough time to convince Congress to do it.  This guy plays more golf than people on the PGA Tour," Trump said.
           Obama and James Foley
   In one of his Sunday tweets, Trump criticized Obama for "once even teeing off immediately after announcing the gruesome death of a great young man by ISIS!"
   This was accurate.  Obama did golf in 2014, while on Martha's Vineyard, Massachusetts, minutes after condemning the murder of journalist James Foley.  Obama conceded in an interview the next month that the golfing was a bad idea, saying, "I should've anticipated the optics."  Obama said the "theater" component of the presidency doesn't come naturally to him, "but it matters."  "


**** My research shows: 
  Barack Obama played 113 rounds of golf in his first four years as President. And another 220 in his second term - for a total of 333 games.
  Trump has spent 302 days at a golf club or resort since he took office, with 238 days left in his first term in office.  He is believed to have played golf between 248 and 266 times, as neither he nor his aides will verify whether Trump actually played golf or not.  He has been photographed in golf clothes, with a golf club in his hand(s) on 248 separate days while actually on a golf course...
     Costs
   I can only find numbers for all 8 years of Obama's golfing and travel expenses...  According to the conservative-leaning government transparency organization "Judicial Watch," Obama's total family travel expenses (over 8 years) - including all his time spent on the golf course - came out to about $96 million in total.  However, a great deal of those travel costs were reimbursed by the Democratic Party as a whole. 
   As of  20 February 2020, just the cost of Trump's personal golf trips had cost the US taxpayers $153 million.  That does not include the costs of his political rallies, using Air Force One; nor the costs of his 6 immediate family members traveling around the world with Secret Security teams in tow to business meetings, vacations, and on big game hunting trips - if that is added in, the amount the US taxpayers have spent on Trump and his family's travels is over $375 million.....     ****

President Obama golfed more than 60% of the time on US military bases, where security did not have to be increased.  He usually made it a day-trip, and usually visited courses on bases extremely close to Washington, DC.
     Trump visits his own company-owned golf courses, and charges the Secret Service a higher-than-normal price for use of the golf carts, food, drink, and room rentals.  One day at a Trump Resort usually costs the US taxpayer more than $30,000 in Secret Service expenses.