‘Ridiculous!’ – Trump Cancels Hunter Biden’s Costly Secret Service Protection

After Hunter Biden made headlines by vacationing in South Africa with a Secret Service detail on a week he was scheduled to appear for a deposition in a civil trial he initiated, President Trump on Monday night announced that he was canceling Hunter’s federal protection, and his half-sister Ashley’s too. 

Trump’s announcement came just hours after a reporter asked him about Hunter’s travel and ongoing, taxpayer-funded security. “I just heard about it for the first time…I would say if there are 18 [Secret Service agents] with Hunter Biden… That will be something I look at this afternoon,” he replied amid a tour of the Kennedy Center, where he earlier this year installed himself as chairman of the board. 

True to his word, at 5pm Monday, Trump took to his Truth Social account to inform Hunter, Ashley and America that the government would no longer provide security protection for Joe Biden’s adult children: 

“Hunter Biden has had Secret Service protection for an extended period of time, all paid for by the United States Taxpayer. There are as many as 18 people on this Detail, which is ridiculous!  … Please be advised that, effective immediately, Hunter Biden will no longer receive Secret Service protection. Likewise, Ashley Biden who has 13 agents will be taken off the list.”

To get some idea of how much the Bidens’ security details were costing Americans, a Daily Mail Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) inquiry determined that the Secret Service spent more than $4.5 million to protect Hunter over an 18-month period between the start of 2021 and June 2022, while Biden lived in Malibu. During that stretch, the service shelled out $30,000 a month just for a villa to house their agents.  

Former presidents and their spouses are assured of life-long Secret Serve protection by federal statute. Protection for children over age 16, terminates along with the president’s term in office — officially, but not in practice. Outgoing presidents frequently extend adult children’s coverage for up to six months, as Biden, Trump, Obama and George W. Bush all did. Already during his second term, Trump has canceled elective federal protection for several other individuals, including former NIAID director Anthony Fauci, Trump’s former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and his former national security adviser John Bolton.   

It’s not clear exactly when Secret Service agents will step away from Biden’s children. “We are aware of the President’s decision to terminate protection for Hunter and Ashley Biden,” said Secret Service spokesperson Anthony Guglielmi in a statement. “The Secret Service will comply and is actively working with the protective details and the White House to ensure compliance as soon as possible.” 

At the same time he was in South Africa, Hunter was scheduled to give a deposition pursuant to a lawsuit he filed against former Trump staffer Garrett Ziegler, accusing him of illegally hacking and then circulating 10,000 photos from Hunter’s infamous “Laptop from Hell.” Earlier this month, Hunter told the judge he wanted to drop the case, on the basis that he had millions of dollars in debt and sales of his artwork and memoir were tanking.

Secret Service agents no longer having to follow Hunter to the hood to buy crackpic.twitter.com/pOfg49F4Uy https://t.co/cL4Sl0eks7

— Mostly Peaceful Memes (@MostlyPeacefull) March 17, 2025

Hunter was already in Cape Town when the judge agreed to cancel the case on Thursday. “That means he [was] assuming his daddy’s appointee is gonna rubber stamp what he wants,” Ziegler told the New York Post. In an unusual twist, Ziegler had sought to contest Hunter’s dropping of the case. “Hunter wants to cry uncle,” he said. “We are OPPOSING that. We want our attorney’s fees to be paid, for Hunter to cease lying about us and me, and just generally to shut the f**k up.”

Trump’s Monday announcement took aim at Hunter’s current travel destination. “He is currently vacationing in, of all places, South Africa, where the Human Rights of people has [sic] been strenuously questioned,” wrote Trump, who earnestly supports the governments of Israel, Saudi Arabia, and other countries where the human rights of people have been strenuously questioned. Hunter’s wife, Melissa Cohen Biden, is South African, and we’ll watch to see if Trump condemns South African Elon Musk should he decide to visit family in his crumbling native country where whites are in increasing peril.