Biden hits Democratic fundraising record with star-studded $28mn LA event

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Joe Biden has raised $28mn for his re-election campaign from a star-studded fundraiser in Los Angeles that shows how Hollywood is sticking with the Democratic president in his race against Donald Trump.

Biden arrived in California on Saturday after flying to the event from the G7 summit in Italy, as his geopolitical priorities quickly made way for the need to bolster his campaign coffers ahead of the November vote.

The fundraiser in California will feature former president Barack Obama as well as actors George Clooney and Julia Roberts.

Hollywood remains a bastion of Democratic support even as Silicon Valley has shifted towards the right and is becoming a more prominent source of Republican money. Donald Trump recently raised $12mn there at a fundraiser with venture capitalists and entrepreneurs.

Biden’s Hollywood fundraiser is the biggest in the history of the Democratic party, eclipsing his earlier blockbuster campaign finance event in March at Radio City Music Hall in New York City that raised $26mn for the campaign.

Biden Campaign finance chair Rufus Gifford told the Financial Times that it had sought to build on the success in New York by aiming “to create something similar on the west coast”.

“Folks are fired up and we were able to exceed our own expectations,” he said.

Biden built up a $70mn cash advantage in the early months of the year, but Trump has been fundraising frantically to catch up, tapping Republican donors from Wall Street to Florida and Texas in an effort to help him return to the White House.

Trump’s campaign says it benefited from a fundraising surge since his criminal conviction in a New York court in late May. Full campaign finance reports for the second quarter will be released in mid-July.

According to the Fivethirtyeight.com polling average, Trump has a national lead of 1.1 percentage points over Biden, and an edge in the key battleground states that will decide the election.

Later this month Biden and Trump will face each other in their first televised debate in Atlanta, which could be a pivotal test for both candidates. That will be followed by their parties’ nominating conventions, which will take place in July for the Republicans and August for the Democrats.