Sarah Blaskey - The Grifters Club: Trump, Mar-a-Lago, and the Selling of the Presidency

IT WAS A WARM AFTERNOON in late March as two intruders stepped onto the grounds of the White House.

It wasnt the secure compound in Washington, DC. Rather, it was the Winter White HouseMar-a-Lagothe gilded palace on the fabulously wealthy South Florida island of Palm Beach that President Donald J. Trump calls home. In its maze of rooms and walls decorated with Genovese Doria stone, colorful Spanish tiles, ornate Venetian tapestries, and marble from Cuba, the unexpected leader of the free world holds court with an odd assortment of billionaires and crooks, conspiracy theorists and political fixers.

On March 30, 2019, one of the intruders came walking down the beach.

The midday sun was baking the skin of millionaires at Mar-a-Lagos Beach Club when the man arrived. Socialites peeked out from under the brims of their floppy sun hats as they sipped coconut water through lips plumped with hyaluronic acid fillers. Few could look more out of place in the WASP-y beachfront enclave of Palm Beach than the man, who was large enough to prompt double-takes from most passers-by and had a tribal tattoo stamped across one side of his face.

He was impossible to miss as he walked onto a property guarded by Secret Service agents and local law enforcement officers typically stationed near the pool. The agents and officers formed part of the outer ring of security protecting the estate of the presidentwho at that moment was out golfing at his club in West Palm Beach four miles away.

But Mike Tyson didnt mean any harm. He liked the president.

Tysons intrusion was strange and fluky. In contrast, the other security breach was nefarious, a federal magistrate judge would later proclaim from the bench. But neither incident was at all hard to predict. They were both the result of the presidents choice to spend so much of his time at a private club that almost anyone can enter with the right friends or enough money. At Mar-a-Lago, almost anyone can get near Trump.

Its a reality that has Secret Service agents tearing out their hair.

Whereas the White House in DC is one of the most secure compounds in the world, the Winter White House is invitingly porous. Yet throughout his presidency, Trump has insisted on spending more than one month of each year at the club chatting up members and their guests.

Trump has little incentive to heed caution in his interactions with strangers at his club. Hobnobbing at Mar-a-Lago is great for business, after all.

The simple chance to bump into the president sells six-figure club memberships better than any marketing campaign ever could. The number of guests entering the club on Saturday nights exploded after the 2016 election, and the club quickly approached its top membership capacity. An entire industry of online vendors peddling access to the president sprang up around the club almost overnight. On social media, grifters targeted wealthy, social-climbing individuals overseas with meet the president travel packages.

Safety is the top concern at the White House. But money is number one at Trumps Mar-a-Lago. Money is also numbers two and three.

In comparison, security hardly seems to factor in, especially when the president isnt in town, unless its to keep pesky journalists off the property. Even though staffers were once warned to be on the lookout for a reporter sniffing around their apartment building asking for interviews, they say they are not informed about intruders or suspicious incidents, even in cases when someone is arrested.

With dollar signs in his eyes, the president is all but holding the door open for would-be intruders.

Its a mad, mad world up there, one senior federal law enforcement official says of Mar-a-Lago.

By January 2020 there had been 141 reports of suspicious incidents and trespassers at Mar-a-Lago since Trump won the Republican nominationtriple the number from the previous three and a half years. Most never resulted in charges, but tucked into court records are examples of alarming security breaches.

In the early morning on Trumps Inauguration Day a disgruntled, forty-eight-year-old woman snuck through the bushes on the northern side of the property, smeared banana on the windows of cars in the employee parking lot, typed FuckUTrumpB on a computer in the clubs Cloister Bar, and snatched balloons from the grand ballroom. She was arrested after an hour-long romp around the property, during which security tried and failed to turn her away.

Once, on a lark, a college kid visiting his grandparents at the nearby Bath & Tennis Club over Thanksgiving weekend decided to see if he could sneak into Mar-a-Lago.

Mike Tyson traced nearly identical steps to those of the college kid. But the famous boxer didnt get arrested. He was a guest of a member, and thats basically all that mattered.

Tyson had been lunching with his friend, real estate giant Jeff Greene, at Greenes Palm Beach mansion just a few doors down from Mar-a-Lago when he asked to see the presidents estate. Tyson had endorsed Trump for president. And although Greene bashed Trump during a bid for Florida governor in the 2018 Democratic primary (and lostbadly), he is a member of the presidents private club. Its a perk of a business deal he did with the Trump Organization to provide housing for Mar-a-Lagos foreign guest workers. On a whim, Greene agreed to take Tyson to the club. The men walked down the beach together and onto the pool deck at the center of the modern political universe.

At Mar-a-Lago, who can access the club largely comes down to the discretion of its nearly five hundred members.

Secret Service agents check IDs against a list of guests compiled by club security in advance of a presidential visit. Agents physically screen members and guests who might enter areas of the club where they could come into contact with the president.

Agents dont even perform background checks on club guestseven in cases in which the person might be having dinner at the table next to the president.