US taxpayers have shelled out at least $471,000 to Trump's properties since he became president, according to newly revealed documents

• The Trump Organization charges the Secret Service exorbitant rates to protect Trump when he travels to his properties, The Washington Post reported.
• According to federal records and people who have seen the receipts, Trump charged US taxpayers up to $650 per night at the Mar-a-Lago resort dozens of times in 2017, and $396.15 per night dozens of times in 2018.
• The Secret Service was also charged $17,000 per month for a three-bedroom cottage agents rented to protect the president when he traveled to the Trump National Golf Club in Bedminster, NJ.
• US taxpayers shelled out $471,000 to Trump properties from January 2017 to April 2018. The total number is likely much higher since that figure only covers a portion of Trump's time in office.
• Friday's revelation is the latest example of how Trump profits off the presidency.
• Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories.

The Trump Organization charges the Secret Service exorbitant rates to protect President Donald Trump when he travels to his properties, The Washington Post reported on Friday.

Citing federal records and people who have seen the receipts, the Post reported that the Trump Organization billed US taxpayers up to $650 per night dozens of times in 2017 at the Mar-a-Lago resort in Palm Beach, Florida. In 2018, the Trump Organization charged the US government $396.15 per night on dozens of occasions, the Post reported, pointing to documents from Trump's visits.

The Trump Organization also billed the Secret Service when agents rented out a three-bedroom cottage at the Trump National Golf Club in Bedminster, NJ, to protect the president when he traveled there, according to the report. A receipt from 2017 showed that the Trump Organization charged the government $17,000 per month for the cottage, which is an unusually high rate for the area.

The report said that the Secret Service was billed for the cottage even on days when Trump wasn't at the Bedminster golf club.

Receipts and documents released so far show that US taxpayers have shelled out $471,000 to Trump's properties from January 2017 to April 2018. The total cost is likely much higher since that figure only covers a portion of Trump's time in office.

Trump has repeatedly been accused of profiting off the presidency.

He frequently hosts foreign leaders, like Chinese President Xi Jinping and Japanese Prime Minster Shinzo Abe, at Mar-a-Lago, where foreign officials pay the market rate. After Trump became president, several foreign countries with embassies in Washington, DC, began hosting parties and events at Trump properties in what ethics experts say was a bid to curry favor with the president.

In December 2018, the Post reported that Saudi-funded lobbyists rented 500 rooms at the Trump International Hotel in Washington, DC, shortly after the 2016 election. The lobbyists spent more than $270,000 for the rooms, according to the report.

The Republican National Committee has spent nearly $2 million at Trump Organization hotels and resorts. And Trump's campaign, which is funded in part by donations from the president's supporters and big-dollar donors, has spent more than $14 million at his properties.

Last year, Trump faced harsh backlash when Politico reported that members of the US Air Force stayed for days at a time at the five-star Trump Turnberry resort in Scotland as part of an unusual layover on a routine trip from the US to Kuwait to deliver supplies.

"The incidents raise the possibility that the military has helped keep Trump's Turnberry resort afloat," the report said.

Last summer, the president also sparked a firestorm when he announced that the 2020 G-7 conference, which the US is hosting, would take place at the Trump National Doral golf club in Miami, Florida.

"Doral Miami, so it's a great area. We haven't found anything that could even come close to competing it," Trump said at the time.

He later backed off after facing public backlash and allegations that he was using the conference to line his own pockets.

Friday's report about the Trump Organization billing the Secret Service, meanwhile, flies in the face of Eric Trump's claim that if his father travels, members of his government detail "stay at our properties for free meaning, like, cost for housekeeping."