Free Republic

After two items last week on the cost of lodging for Vice President Joe Biden´s early February trip to Europe, other news organizations began to investigate further. Wolf Blitzer´s show The Situation Room on CNN uncovered a contract apparently also related to the same visit to Paris: Also on the receipt was $321,665 for a limousine company. Although CNN did not link to the document, the notice of the contract award for the limousine service was posted on the same government website as the hotel contracts.

Dem Strategist Hillary Rosen on CNN: "This sequester has belt-tightening all over the place and I think you could argue, for appearance sake, 'Let's do this, let's do that.' There are a hundred things. I don't know that the Republican members of Congress have cancelled all of their Spring Break 'codels,' as they call them, the boondoggle trips that they take. That would also be an appearance thing.

Vice President Joe Biden's trip to Europe last month led to a hefty tab with over $1 million for hotels for himself, staff and security for two nights in London and Paris, government documents show. As first reported by The Weekly Standard, documents show that the U.S. State Department obtained contracts with two five-star hotels in London and Paris where the vice president stayed for two nights during a five-day tour of Europe last month. "These costs are nothing out of the ordinary. They are in line with high-level travel across multiple administrations," the State Department official said.

As it turns out, Vice President Joe Biden's London stay in February was not the most expensive part of his trip. A government document released on February 14, 2013 shows that the contract for the Hotel Intercontinental Paris Le Grand came in at $585,000.50....

Paris may be known as the City of Light, but that title certainly doesn’t mean that visitors are light on spending as Vice President Joe Biden’s one day trip cost taxpayers more than half a million dollars. When Mr Biden and his hefty entourage stayed in Paris for an evening in early February and it cost $585,000.50 for that single night. The Vice President likely rented out more than 100 rooms in the Hotel Intercontinental Paris Le Grand, though they must not have gotten a group discount rate. The price was reported by The Weekly Standard after they discovered the...