Did Obama Pay Campaign Money To Wright

President Obama and Hillary Clinton walk off Air Force One in Charlotte, N.C., to nourish a Clinton campaign result. The costs of that flight will exist repaid by the Autonomous National Committee. Nicholas Kamm/AFP/Getty Images hide caption

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Nicholas Kamm/AFP/Getty Images

President Obama and Hillary Clinton walk off Air Strength I in Charlotte, Due north.C., to attend a Clinton campaign effect. The costs of that flight will be repaid past the Democratic National Committee.

Nicholas Kamm/AFP/Getty Images

Air Force I: Who pays?

That'south the question a lot of people were request after Hillary Clinton hitched a ride to Charlotte, Northward.C., this week with President Obama for their showtime joint entrada advent.

While information technology's unusual for an incumbent president to campaign actively for his would-be successor, the question itself is not new. Information technology's been raised before whenever presidents travel for their own re-election campaign or on behalf of House and Senate candidates and campaign committees.

"There are payments that are made by the [Democratic National Committee] to the federal government anytime the president is traveling for political purposes," White House spokesman Josh Earnest told reporters, who were likewise flying aboard the presidential 747. "Those rules apply both for routine fundraising trips but likewise when Secretary Clinton is aboard Air Strength One."

The rules allocate a portion of the flight costs to the DNC or the Clinton campaign. But they practise non cover the full cost of operating Air Force One, estimated at $206,337 per hr. (It should exist noted, that precise hourly rate is an Air Force accounting fiction of its own.)

Reimbursement rates are based on what it would cost to charter a plane to carry only entrada travelers. According to the FEC regulations, this aeroplane "need not exist the same size as the government-operated shipping actually used. ... For example, a meaning portion of Air Forcefulness One may exist occupied by personnel and equipment mandated by national-security requirements and other needs associated with the office of the President, not the campaign."

In practice, reimbursement rates might exist based on what information technology costs to charter a smaller Boeing 737, which is cheaper to operate than Air Force I.

Prior to 2009, political reimbursement rates were fifty-fifty cheaper, based on the price of commercial airfare. So the Obama re-ballot entrada paid a college reimbursement rate in 2012 than the Bush re-election entrada did eight years earlier. Commercial airfares are nonetheless used to calculate the costs paid by journalists traveling aboard Air Force One, unless there's a separate printing lease, in which case journalists pay the full toll of that plane. Campaign rules also spell out an alternative reimbursement rate that candidates can use for authorities shipping on which the public is allowed to travel for a published fee.

Considering the Charlotte trip was purely political, the Clinton campaign will pay the full reimbursement rate. When trips include a mix of politics and official business organization (a distinction that's sometimes fuzzy), costs are allocated accordingly, though the formula for doing then is somewhat opaque.

Source: https://www.npr.org/2016/07/07/485097272/fact-check-air-force-one-who-pays

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