Trump’s visits cause fuss in New Jersey

President Donald Trump’s latest White House getaway is bringing more protesters, airport security hassles and police overtime — but now it’s New Jersey getting the Palm Beach treatment.

With Trump’s Mar-aLago Club shuttered for the summer, the Trump National Golf Club in Bedminster, N.J., is becoming the new presidential weekend escape destination.

Following seven trips to Palm Beach after taking office, Trump made his second post-inauguration visit to his exclusive New Jersey club this weekend.

Now, Bedminster is trying to learn from Palm Beach’s sometimes rocky relationship with hosting the president.

New Jersey leaders are

already following Palm Beach County’s lead and angling for federal reimbursement of increased police security costs.

“We were really concerned about the impact on local taxpayers,” Bedminster Mayor Steve Parker said. “We still don’t know how many visits we are going to get.”

Small airports near Bedminster — where aviation businesses have been grounded by presidential security rules during Trump visits — are joining the push from Palm Beach County’s Lantana Airport to try to get the Secret Service to ease flight limits.

“We are completely shut down when he’s in Bedminster,” said Suzanne Nagle, one of the owners of Solberg Airport. “It’s too early to tell what’s going to happen because we don’t know how often he is going to come.”

Also, New Jersey protest groups have called their South Florida counterparts for tips on how to overcome difficulties demonstrating near the president — made difficult because he spends most of his time behind the gates at Trump properties.

New Jersey demonstrators driving decorated cars have been holding weekly protest parades — called The People’s Motorcade — outside the gates to Trump’s Bedminster Club ever since his last visit in early May.

“We honk our horns. People ride their bikes,” said Analilia Mejia, of the group New Jersey Working Families. “It’s been growing . ... We are not content to allow business as usual.”

Palm Beach and Bedminster are both affluent towns with similar populations of over 8,000 people, though in Palm Beach that can swell by about 20,000 seasonal residents during the fall and winter.

While Palm Beach features oceanfront luxury and ritzy Worth Avenue shopping, Bedminster’s upscale neighborhoods are spread over central New Jersey horse farm country, about 50 miles from Manhattan.

During Palm Beach visits, Trump’s motorcade typically shuttles him between Mar-a-Lago and his golf courses in West Palm Beach and Jupiter. But in New Jersey, the president can stay put at his Bedminster club, where he has two golf courses and a residence.

“He remained on the golf course. It was pretty quiet,” Parker said about Trump’s visit in May. “It’s not like he was going downtown to have a pizza.”

Trump’s 535-acre golf club in Bedminster is the town’s second biggest property taxpayer.

Even if the president stays put at the club during his Bedminster trips, the small community police department with 18 officers faces a growing overtime expense, the mayor said.

That translates to about $42,000 in overtime costs per presidential visit, Parker said. That would add up to nearly $300,000 if the president makes seven trips to Bedminster, like he did to Palm Beach. Over four years, the costs could top $1 million.

By comparison, the Palm Beach County Sheriff’s Office estimates that Trump’s visits to Palm Beach since the election — which included Trump hosting the leaders of Japan and China — already have cost local taxpayers more than $4 million in increased security costs.

Both Bedminster and Palm Beach County are counting on about $61 million included in a congressional budget deal reimbursing those and future presidential security costs.

That federal money doesn’t include help for aviation businesses that have to temporarily shut down during presidential visits in Palm Beach County and near Bedminster.

Flight training, airplane rentals and sightseeing companies at the Lantana airport in Palm Beach County have had to turn away customers during Trump’s visits because of rules against flying near Mar-a-Lago.

Now businesses at Somerset Airport and Solberg Airport near Trump’s Bedminster club face similar restrictions, at a time when Nagle said they are usually their busiest.

“Sixty percent of our business is on the weekend, and most of our business is during the summer months,” Nagle said. “They are taking away our business.”

Tourists, protesters and anyone else hoping for a peek at the president and his weekend retreat destination have a tougher time in Bedminster than they do in Palm Beach.

The mansion and 75-foot-tall tower at Mar-aLago are visible from across the water in West Palm Beach, but Trump’s Bedminster club is more isolated from public view.

Buildings at Trump National Golf Club in Bedminster are almost a mile away from the guardhouse. And the entrance is off a narrow public road, with no sidewalks and shoulders for people to gather near the presidential estate.

To try to attract attention, protesters have used overpasses along Trump’s motorcade route into town.

The limited public access near Trump’s club is why demonstrators say they started the drive-by protests — using their horns, decorated cars and signs to criticize the president for everything from his tax returns to suspected connections between Trump or his associates and Russia.

The demonstration has ranged from about 15 cars on a rainy day to more than 35 when the weather cooperates, according to organizers.

“We are using what we have available to us, which is the roadway,” said protester Jim Girvan, of Branchburg, N.J., near Bedminster. He participates in the so-called People’s Motorcade. “We are going to be going all summer long.”

Trump is expected to resume weekend trips to his Southern White House when Mar-a-Lago reopens in the fall — when temperatures cool and the Palm Beach social season resumes.

But when Trump’s White House days are through, Bedminster could end up winning the long-term distinction as Trump’s primary residence — and maybe even his final resting place.

Trump likes his Bedminster estate so much that he convinced the township to allow Trump family gravesites on the sprawling property.