U.S. President Donald Trump will begin a 17-day “working vacation” Friday at his golf club in New Jersey, after repeatedly criticizing former president Barack Obama for taking days off.
In numerous tweets and interviews between 2011 and 2014, Trump slammed Obama for vacations.
He also criticized people for taking vacations in his 2004 book, “Trump: Think Like a Billionaire.”
“Don’t take vacations. What’s the point? If you’re not enjoying your work, you’re in the wrong job,” Trump wrote.
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But Trump may not have had much of a choice. According to The Associated Press, everyone who works in the White House West Wing, including the Oval Office occupant himself, must clear out by the end of the week so that the government can replace a run-down 27-year-old heating and cooling system.
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However, according to The Washington Post, including this vacation, Trump has taken off 53 days since he became president. During the same amount of time, Obama took 15 days off.
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The president has also been criticized for spending too much time on the golf course, particularly Mar-a-Lago in Florida. Trips became so frequent that a website by the name of IsTrumpAtMaraLago.org was created by the American Progressive Action Fund to track his visits.
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Trump justified spending time at the golf course by reportedly telling his friends that the White House is a “dump.”
But it’s not uncommon for presidents to take time off in August.
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Bill Clinton and Obama both spent August vacations on Martha’s Vineyard in Massachusetts. George W. Bush went to his Texas ranch.
Despite Trump’s own criticism of vacations, taking time off is recommended, especially for those stressful jobs, psychology professor at the University of Massachusetts Amherst Susan Krauss told The Associated Press.
“Perhaps it’s good that someone as important as our president is showing that he believes it’s beneficial to take a break from the office,” she said.
— With files from The Associated Press
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