PALM BEACH, Florida — Former President Donald Trump told Breitbart News exclusively that he thinks the record shows that Democrat President Joe Biden is taking far too many vacations as president, and that when Biden is on the beach he refuses to do any actual work.
Trump’s comments came during Breitbart News’s latest more than two-hour-long exclusive interview on Thursday evening last week with the 2024 GOP frontrunner and former president at his luxurious seaside resort Mar-a-Lago here in south Florida.
When talking about the failures with the border during the Biden administration, Trump lamented that had Biden instead of ripping up all of his policies at the beginning of his presidency just gone to the beach and let Trump’s actions stand, then the country would be in much better shape.
“If Biden only would have gone to that beach he goes to so much and just sat there trying to lift the chair, which weighs about three ounces,” then things would be better for the country, Trump told Breitbart News.
At that point, Breitbart News asked Trump about how Biden was yet again vacationing in the U.S. Virgin Islands—and how the current president spent more than a third of the past year totally checked out.
Trump replied by saying that when he went on vacation as president, he was always actually working and taking meetings with world leaders and lawmakers—and he never made anyone who had urgent business wait for a call back. He called Mar-a-Lago, where he spent some of his holidays as president, the “Southern White House,” and noted that he regularly packed his schedule even when he was not in the White House.
“I have to say, when I take vacations I’m always working,” Trump said. “This is really the Southern White House. I have meetings left, right, and all day. Even if I’m playing golf, I’m always playing golf with somebody who is important like heads of countries, senators, et cetera. But it’s all work.”
Trump is right that he regularly hosted world leaders and lawmakers at Mar-a-Lago. For instance, during his presidency, he hosted the late ex-Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe there at least twice. He also hosted Chinese president Xi Jinping there early in his presidency, and regularly held meetings with other world leaders, such as those from Caribbean countries, as well as with U.S. lawmakers.
When Biden goes on vacation, though, Trump said he hears that he refuses to take phone calls and refuses to meet anyone—he just totally and completely checks out and makes himself unavailable for weeks on end.
“This guy takes a vacation and he doesn’t talk to anybody,” Trump said. “They say, ‘He’ll call you in two or three weeks because he’s on vacation.’ Did you know that? People call him and they say he’ll try getting back to you in the next two to three weeks because he’s on vacation.”
A report this weekend noted that in 2023 alone Biden spent 138 days on vacation at places like Rehoboth Beach in Delaware or at Camp David, among other posh vacation spots. That means the president spent more than a third—a total of 37 percent—of the past year not doing work. This trend is not new for Biden in 2023, either—it’s something he started in 2021, and continued in 2022 and 2023.
Over the course of his entire presidency, according to the Republican National Committee (RNC) as Breitbart News previously reported, Biden has spent a whopping 417 days—or 39 percent of the time since he took office on Jan. 20, 2021—on vacation.
Biden has arrived in the U.S. Virgin Islands, where he'll spend the rest of the year at the beach.
Biden has spent 417 days — 39% of his presidency — on vacation. pic.twitter.com/JWYXvGrvIv
— RNC Research (@RNCResearch) December 27, 2023
Biden is currently vacationing on St. Croix in the U.S. Virgin Islands for the New Year holiday.
A New York Post report noted that each year so far as president Biden has taken more days on vacation away from the White House than the previous three presidents–Trump, Barack Obama, and George W. Bush–did during their entire presidencies. During Trump’s presidency, he took 132 days over four years away from the White House. Obama, per the report, spent 38 days away from the White House. Bush, the report notes, spent 100 days away from the White House at his ranch in Texas.
More from Trump’s latest exclusive interview with Breitbart News is forthcoming.
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