Trump Tower Security Costs: NYC Spending $150K Per Day To Protect Melania And Barron

MIDTOWN MANHATTAN, NY — City taxpayers are spending around $150,000 per day on a personal NYPD and FDNY security detail for First Lady Melania Trump and her 10-year-old son, Barron, at their gilded penthouse in Trump Tower on Fifth Avenue, according to updated figures released by city officials this week.

Melania Trump has said she plans to stay in Manhattan at least until Barron finishes the school year in June and plans to fly back a bunch for visits even if she does move to the White House.

Each weekday, Barron is reportedly escorted to and from his home between 56th and 57th streets to his Upper West Side private school, Columbia Grammar and Prep on 93rd Street, by an envoy of Secret Service agents and NYPD officers.

The president himself hasn't returned to NYC in the month since he took up residence in D.C.

"We estimate that New York City will spend an average of $127,000 to $146,000 a day for the NYPD and $4.5 million annually for FDNY to protect the First Lady and her son while they reside in Trump Tower after the inauguration," James O'Neill, the head of the NYPD, said in a letter he sent to Congress on Tuesday, requesting federal funds to cover the costs.

That's on top of $24 million the city already spent to protect the Tower from Election Day through Inauguration Day, the police commissioner said, while then-President-elect Donald Trump was still living in Midtown.

If the president does decide to visit his wife and child in the future, NYPD security costs during his visits would amount to around $308,000 per day, O'Neill said — just as they did when he still lived at the Tower.

Mayor Bill de Blasio previously high-balled the city's daily cost of protecting President Trump at more like $500,000.

The NYPD and the Mayor's Office did not respond to requests from Patch on Thursday for a budgetary breakdown of where these millions have been coming from — and how, if at all, the city's massive Trump Tower security costs have been gouging any other part of the police budget.

There has been speculation and worry among members of the City Council that the NYPD could be diverting officers and other resources from other NYC neighborhoods in order to protect the president's brood. "Is this moving us away from the goal of moving toward a community policing model in New York City?" City Council Member Donovan Richards Jr., who represents the Rockaways, pressed at a council meeting last month.

The mayor's proposed budget for next year doesn't set aside any money for guarding the Tower.

"Because we continue to work with Congress for full reimbursement, we did not include additional funding for Trump security costs in the FY18 Preliminary Budget," a mayoral spokesperson said.

Just last weekend, U.S. Sen. Chuck Schumer, a Democrat from New York, joined the growing chorus of politicians pressing Trump to set aside funds in the federal budget for his security detail in NYC.

"It's just unfair to make New York City taxpayers pay for the job of protecting the president," Schumer said Sunday.