Since the beginning of Barack Obama’s administration, the Obamas have become increasingly notorious for unnecessary, luxurious travel, under the guise of official business. 

They are part of continuum reaching back across to the earliest days of the Obama administration. Recently, Judicial Watch obtained flight expense records from the U.S. Department of the Air Force revealing that Michelle Obama’s June 2015 trip to the United Kingdom and Italy, accompanied by her daughters and mother, cost the taxpayers $240,495.67 in flight expenses alone. 

The records were released in response to a Freedom of Information (FOIA) request filed on June 22, 2015. The flights to London, England; and Milan, Venice, and Vicenza, Italy, for the June 15 – 21, 2015, trip totaled 20:35 hours at the cost of $11,684 per hour, bringing the flight expense total to $240,495.67, according to the Air Force documents. 

Judicial Watch uncovered an expensive combination of trips by the Obamas to Africa and Honolulu, which cost taxpayers $15,885,585.30 in flight expenses alone. The single largest prior known expense for accommodations was for Michelle Obama’s side-trip to Dublin, Ireland, during the 2013 G-8 conference in Belfast, when she and her entourage booked 30 rooms at the five-star Shelbourne Hotel, and where she stayed in the 1500 square-foot Princess Grace suite at a cost of $3,500 a night.