Secretary of State Mike Pompeo's wife Susan travels on govt aircraft during shutdown

Trump admin is taking American taxpayers for suckers...

At a time when most State Department staff weren't allowed to travel for work and some weren't even allowed to use their work phones, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo's wife Susan embarked on an eight-day trip with her husband, requiring unpaid staffers to prepare and support her across the Middle East.

Many diplomats, already demoralized by the partial government shutdown, were angry, according to multiple sources familiar with the situation."Eyebrows were raised from the start, from the planning, on why is she coming, and why is she coming during the shutdown?," one person familiar with the matter told CNN.
A senior State Department official said "This is BS. You don't bring more people that need staffing, transportation, etc. when embassy employees are working without being paid."
It was Susan Pompeo's presence on the trip at a time State Department staff are working without pay that seemed to cause the furor. There are also questions over whether the use of State Department staffers' time to assist her violated federal regulations.
The State Department says most diplomats abroad have not been paid during the shutdown. Sources said many had to come to work anyway to handle this trip -- for some requiring very long hours. It's unclear exactly how many people on the Pompeo trip were not being paid.

According to three people familiar, Susan Pompeo was assigned a control officer who worked exclusively with her. That person was on call for weeks, the sources said, and at each of the stops, Susan Pompeo had her own staffer and her own security personnel.
Furloughed, unpaid State department employees in the various overseas embassies were called in to support the trip by the secretary of state, because his travels are considered a high priority.
Two sources familiar with the situation said that at one of the stops, a staffer and security were tasked with taking Susan Pompeo to the local market and shopping with her -- an activity which caused a delay of about 35 minutes in departure to the next stop, they said.

https://edition.cnn.com/2019/01/18/politics/pompeo-wife-middle-east-trip/index.html