Wilkes-Barre Township Police Chief Will Clark had low expectations when he sent a bill to Donald Trump’s political action committee.
Trump’s presidential campaigns were notorious for enforcing police branch spending for special major security points at political rallies across the country. Clark’s own Pennsylvania branch still has an unpaid bill for additional security at a “Make America Great Again rally” in 2018.
He is now asking for a new payment of $9,820. 62 to cover police overtime and public works at Trump’s “Save America” rally at Mohegan Sun Arena in September.
So when the check arrived weeks later, Clark said he briefly thought about sunbathing a copy and hanging it on the wall “to commemorate the fact that we were refunded. “
“I fully expected that this one wouldn’t be paid for either, but we were surprised,” he said, adding that “it would obviously get huge advantages for the taxpayer. “
Although Trump held several rallies, Save America PAC appears to have paid for police security facilities in one location during the 2022 election cycle: Wilkes-Barre Township in Pennsylvania, according to Federal Election Commission revelations reviewed via Insider.
It’s unclear how or why the city got lucky under Trump, who announced Nov. 15 that he would run for president in 2024.
During Trump’s crusades, more than a dozen cities across the country, plus Minneapolis; Spokane, Washington; Albuquerque, New Mexico; and Erie, Pa. , said Trump’s crusade would pay for police and public protection expenses totaling nearly $2 million.
Meanwhile, Trump ran as a pro-police candidate who chided Democrats for being lenient on crime and law enforcement.
“LAW AND ORDER, NO FUNDING AND ABOLITION OF POLICE,” Trump tweeted in June 2020.
Many cash-strapped governments have appealed to Trump’s sense of duty. The government in El Paso, Texas, played hard and threatened legal action to force Trump’s political operation to pay a police bill that, after late fees, reached thousands of dollars. .
But El Paso was never paid for, and many municipal governments stopped looking for costs altogether, believing the effort and expense were no longer worth it.
Clark gave up on seeing the nearly $22,000 he said Trump’s crusade owed his branch and partners for overtime at the 2018 event, which required more staff because he was president at the time.
Along with the Trump campaign, Clark also tried to send the bill to the Republican National Committee and Lou Barletta, the Trump-backed former congressman from Pennsylvania who failed to oust Democratic Sen. Bob Casey in that race.
“We never beat any of them,” he said.
Trump’s Array the Republican National Committee and Barletta’s did not respond to a request for comment.
Paying to protect Trump at his many rallies has a catch.
Unless a Trump rally is held at a government-run facility where local officials can ask for a contract to use the facilities, local police have limited force to force Trump, or any political figure, to pay for mandatory public protection measures to secure an event in a private venue that can attract thousands of other people and would-be protesters.
Trump’s crusade said in 2020 that requests for public protection billing should be directed to the Secret Service. But the Secret Service says Congress has not provided investments to the company to reimburse local police for the support they provide to protect Trump’s events.
While some political candidates duly paid for crusade-related police expenses (Texas Sen. Ted Cruz paid them their entire 2016 presidential bid, for example), others, adding President Barack Obama’s crusade, have been inconsistent. Senator Bernie Sanders in 2016 did not pay his expenses for his presidential crusade until months after the fact, after being urged to do so.
Police owe it to the general public to ensure some protection when primary events occur in their communities, Clark said. But forcing taxpayers to pay for additional transactions can be a “sore point. “
“This is a victory. This is a primary victory,” Clark said, when a personal organization reimburses the branch for those extra costs. “Our municipality is financially stable, but that doesn’t mean we forget about refunds. The duty of the taxpayer is to look for the most effective tactics to provide mandatory police services. In cases where those expenses due are not paid, it is ultimately the taxpayer who will foot the bill for the additional police coverage, and it is not necessarily fair to them. “
Clark said his branch won two police bills at Trump events, one in 2016 and the last in September.
“So we’re two times three,” he said. That in baseball jargon is an average of 66% to be reimbursed and that’s pretty good. “
The September 3 event at the Mohegan Sun was a rally of Republican gubernatorial candidates and U. S. Senator Doug Mastriano and Mehmet Oz, who lost on Election Day.
The event required seven more police officers, 15 local county sheriff’s deputies who helped and charges for Department of Public Works employees, who used sold trucks to temporarily block a road for Trump’s entrance.
The Scranton Times-Tribune described the cheering crowd as a man dressed in a cowboy hat dotted with stars shouted the message on a banner held by 8 people: “One country under God, indivisible, with freedom and justice for Trump. “
A day earlier, some activists, with permits, had burned flags of Trump, the Confederate States of America, Nazi Germany and the former Soviet Union outside the municipal building. But Clark said there were no arrests or protesters on the day of the protest. The rally
“Everything went well,” he said.
Clark said he did nothing about his success in billing. He discovered a tap for Save America, filed a bill in the mail “and voila, we won a payment. “
“When prices are moderate, you’re more likely to get paid,” he said.
To date, there is only one other recently known case, also without explanation, in which Trump’s crusade paid part of the money he owed to a municipal government. In this case, it’s the city of La Crosse, Wisconsin, for a 2020 crusade titled by then-Vice President Mike Pence.
The town won a check for $5,574, though it was 10 cents short.