Where will Donald Trump live after his singular, chaotic presidential term ends? Not at his Mar-a-Lago club in Florida, if neighbors get their way.
Neighbors in Palm Beach sent a letter to the town and the U.S. Secret Service this week opposing the president’s retirement to his “winter White House.” And based on a 1993 agreement signed by Trump, who was then a New York City real estate developer without a reality television show that catapulted him to bigger fame, he very well may not be able to move forward with his tropical domicile dreams.
The Washington Post reported: “Under the [1993] agreement, club members are banned from spending more than 21 days a year in the club’s guest suites and cannot stay there for any longer than seven consecutive days. Before the arrangement was sealed, an attorney for Trump assured the town council in a public meeting that he would not live at Mar-a-Lago.”
Trump has been expected to relocate there permanently after President-elect Joe Biden is inaugurated on January 20; PEOPLE reported this month that staff have been renovating his private residence at the club while First Lady Melania Trump has sought out schools in the area for Barron, their teenage son.
The president officially switched his residence from Manhattan to Florida in 2019, and voted for himself there during the 2020 election. The move was perceived to be a money-saving strategy, as the president could be exempt from state taxes in Florida.
But neighbors of Mar-a-Lago are fed up with the clogged roads and other disruptions in the neighborhood due to Trump’s high profile and frequent visits, the Post reported. Any legal dispute to prevent Trump from shacking up in Florida could also complicate the work of the U.S. Secret Service, which protects ex-presidents after they leave office.
“Palm Beach has many lovely estates for sale,” the neighbors’ letter, penned by an attorney, reads, “and we are confident President Trump will find one which meets his needs.”
This sun-tanned form of NIMBYism almost feels too rich for a president who lost his re-election campaign after making racist pleas to white voters — especially those in the suburbs — about who he’d protect them from, and the supposed threats to their own backyards.
“There is no document or agreement in place that prohibits President Trump from using Mar-a-Lago as his residence,” a Trump business spokesperson told the Post on the condition of anonymity. The spokesperson did not offer a specific rebuttal to the claims in the neighbors’ letter.
Even without a posh country club as his escape, it’s unlikely Trump will fade into obscurity after his presidency.
He is expected to have a rougher go at returning to normal life than, say, his predecessor Barack Obama, who recently published a best-selling memoir and has inked a coveted deal with the streaming service Netflix. Trump has already banked funding through a super PAC, reportedly discussed a 2024 run (perhaps to the chagrin of other Republican presidential hopefuls), and considered launching a news outlet to rival his darling Fox News.
But there could be wrenches in his plans. The president doesn’t exactly have a clean record with which to pursue lofty political goals.
According to bombshell reporting by The New York Times, Trump has barely paid any federal taxes in years. After he loses the immunity provided by his current job, as columnist Michelle Goldberg wrote in November, he will likely “be consumed by lawsuits and criminal investigations.”
Goldberg added: “Hundreds of millions of dollars in debt will come due. Lobbyists and foreign dignitaries won’t have much of a reason to patronize Mar-a-Lago or his Washington hotel. Fox News owner Rupert Murdoch could complete the transition from Trump’s enabler to his enemy. And, after four years of cartoonish self-abasement, Republicans with presidential aspirations will have an incentive to help take him down.”
All of that said, Trump has previously publicly suggested other relocation plans if he were to lose the election. While rallying his base at a campaign event during a pandemic this fall in Georgia, the president made a quip that many critics felt embodied his characteristic narcissism.
“Could you imagine if I lose?” he said. “I’m not going to feel so good. Maybe I’ll have to leave the country, I don’t know.”
He has not made any further comments regarding his post-presidency living plans, as he still has not conceded the election, despite the Electoral College making it constitutionally official this week.