When President Obama attended the G-20 summit in Brisbane, Australia last November, the entire delegation required over 5,000 room nights at five different hotels over the course of the summit, costing $2.1 million. Transporting all those people around Brisbane was not cheap: the State Department just released details of a contract for transportation services that estimated the cost at $1,370,098.
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Unlike some of these contract postings, this one did not include details on the number or types of vehicles required, but others in the past have included sedans, SUVs, vans, box trucks for cargo, and even buses. Cost comparisons are problematic since prices vary greatly from country to country and often drivers are included in the contracts, but a quick check of Washington, D.C. prices reveals that $1.37 million would, at retail prices, pay for a fleet of 100 Jeep Grand Cherokees for almost four months.
Although exact dates are not provided by the government, it’s likely advance teams, security personnel, and various diplomats were in Brisbane for two or even three weeks around President Obama’s visit. The president himself was only in the country for about a day, and, of course, the White House flies in vehicles used by the president on foreign trips. For instance, the Washington Post reported that for the Obamas’ trip to Africa in 2013, the military flew in “56 support vehicles, including 14 limousines and three trucks.”
