- Palm Beach officials confirmed that they are conducting a legal review at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago home.
- The news comes a month after the former president’s neighbors sued him for violating a 1993 agreement.
- After converting his private residence into a club in 1993, Trump agreed to limit his stays there.
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Palm Beach officials have confirmed that they are conducting a legal review of former President Trump’s residence in Mar-a-Lago a month after neighbors sued him for violating a 1993 agreement with the city.
More than 25 years ago, Trump made a legal agreement with the city of Palm Beach that would limit his stays in Mar-a-Lago in exchange for turning his private residence into a social club.
Under the terms of the agreement, the two parties agreed that no guest, including Trump, is allowed to remain at the club for more than “three non-consecutive seven-day periods” over a year.
But the former president’s decision to make Mar-a-Lago his permanent residence after his stay at the White House could complicate matters.
Trump has already stayed at the luxury residence for more than a week after moving on January 20.
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Last month, some of the residents of Palm Beach have acted, reportedly writing a letter to Palm Beach officials and the U.S. Secret Service saying that Trump had no legal right to live there full time, citing the 1993 deal.
Now, authorities have confirmed that they are investigating the matter and could be discussed at an upcoming city council meeting, the city manager told CNN on Friday.
“This matter is under legal review by our city attorney, John ‘Skip’ Randolph,” Palm Beach city manager Kirk Blouin told CNN. “Mr. Randolph is reviewing the Declaration of Use Agreement and our Ordinance Code to determine whether former President Trump can live in Mar-a-Lago.”
The Trump Organization told The Huffington Post: “There is absolutely no document or agreement in place that prohibits President Trump from using Mar-A-Lago as his residence.”
This is not the first time that Trump has spent time on his visits to Mar-a-Lago.
According to an analysis by The Huffington Post, the former president violated this agreement on three different occasions during his presidency: in 2017, 2019 and 2020.
Trump flew back to Mar-a-Lago with his family on January 20, choosing to skip President Joe Biden’s inauguration.
Since his return, however, the luxury resort has become a “sad” and “discouraged” place, a resort source told MSNBC last week.
Some members, who paid $ 200,000 to join the club, also left the club forever because of concerns that they might be associated with the president or appear in newspaper articles.
“They want nothing to do with Donald Trump,” author Laurence Leamer told MSNBC. “Many of the members don’t go there very often because it is a very discouraged place.”
He continued, “It is a sad place for Trump to leave. It is not what it was.”