Trump WH budget to trim $22M – President donates salary to Military Cemeteries

President Trump hasn’t exactly drained the swamp that is Washington, D.C. (it is a big swamp, after all), but the president is making headway is clamping down on over-spending.

Take the White House payroll. New projections show the four-year savings on White House payroll could top $22 million, Forbes reports, citing “savings come from President Trump’s refusal to take a salary as well as big reductions in other areas including the absence of czars, expensive ‘fellowships,’ and spending on FLOTUS staff.”

For the record, Trump said he would not take his $400,000 annual salary, and in the first fiscal quarter of the year, he donated his pay to the Department of the Interior “for construction and repair needs at military cemeteries.”

Here are some key findings, from Forbes:

• There are 110 fewer employees on White House staff under Trump than under Obama at this point in their respective presidencies.
• $5.1 million in payroll savings vs. the Obama FY2015 payroll. In 2017, the Trump payroll amounts to $35.8 million for 377 employees, while the Obama payroll amounted to $40.9 million for 476 employees (FY2015).
• Nineteen fewer staffers are dedicated to The First Lady of the United States (FLOTUS). Currently, there are five staffers dedicated to Melania Trump vs. 24 staffers who servedMichelle Obama (FY2009).
• Counts of the “Assistants to the President” – the most trusted advisors to the president – are the same (22) in both first-year Trump and Obama administrations. In the Trump White House, Steven Bannon, Kellyanne Conway, Omarosa Manigault, Reince Priebus, Sean Spicer and 17 others make salaries of $179,700. In Obama’s first-year, David Axelrod, Rahm Emanuel and twenty others held the title with top pay of $172,000.
• The highest compensated White House Trump staffer? Mark House, Senior Policy Advisor, has a salary of $187,500. Mr. House is “on detail” from a federal agency which allows him to exceed the top pay-grade of $179,700. In Obama’s Administration (2009), David Marcozzi earned $193,000 “on detail” from Health and Human Services.
• Our review of the Trump White House payroll confirms five staffers dedicated to First Lady Melania Trump. Highly criticized for her twenty-four assistants, advisors, schedulers, directors, deputies, advance aides, associates, social and press secretaries and other helpers, former First Lady Michelle Obama’s staff was only slightly larger than Laura Bush’s staff of eighteen.

Ivanka Trump and her husband, Jared Kushner, both presidential advisors, have also turned down their salaries.

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