Trump Takes Refuge from His National Emergency at Florida Golf Course

“I didn’t need to do this,” Trump said about the emergency declaration on Friday.

President Donald Trump departs Mar-a-lago in Palm Beach, Fla., Saturday, Feb. 16, 2019, to travel to Trump International Golf Club in West Palm Beach, Fla. Andrew Harnik/AP

Fight disinformation: Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily newsletter and follow the news that matters.

The morning after declaring a national emergency, President Donald Trump was spotted at the omelette bar of his West Palm Beach golf club. Trump has no publicly scheduled events this weekend.

During the Friday speech announcing the emergency declaration, Trump said about the declaration, “I didn’t need to do this, but I’d rather do it much faster.” He left for his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida a few hours later.  

Trump’s attempt to use emergency powers to obtain money Congress has refused to provide is already being challenged in court. The total number of unauthorized border crossings is a fraction of what it was in previous decades.

BEFORE YOU CLICK AWAY!

Mother Jones was founded to do journalism differently. We stand for justice and democracy. We reject false equivalence. We go after stories others don’t. We’re a nonprofit newsroom, because the kind of truth-telling investigations we do doesn’t happen under corporate ownership.

And the essential ingredient that makes all this possible? Readers like you.

It’s reader support that enables Mother Jones to devote the time and resources to report the facts that are too difficult, expensive, or inconvenient for other news outlets to uncover. Please help with a donation today if you can—even a few bucks will make a real difference. A monthly gift would be incredible.

payment methods

BEFORE YOU CLICK AWAY!

Mother Jones was founded to do journalism differently. We stand for justice and democracy. We reject false equivalence. We go after stories others don’t. We’re a nonprofit newsroom, because the kind of truth-telling investigations we do doesn’t happen under corporate ownership.

And the essential ingredient that makes all this possible? Readers like you.

It’s reader support that enables Mother Jones to devote the time and resources to report the facts that are too difficult, expensive, or inconvenient for other news outlets to uncover. Please help with a donation today if you can—even a few bucks will make a real difference. A monthly gift would be incredible.

payment methods

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate