Donald Trump has reaped Saturday more than 50 million dollars during a gigantic fundraising evening in Florida, a new crucial episode in the war on big donations which opposes the ;publican and Joe Biden in the race à the White House. In American electoral life, money, far from being a taboo, is a source of pride for the side that amasses the most. It is also an essential windfall: 2024 promises to be the most expensive electoral cycle in the country's history. The two candidates have been engaged for months in this war on millions, regularly sharing laudatory press releases on the state of their finances. This competition of muscles accelerated with the holding at the end of March of a large reception in New York, during which Democratic President Joe Biden raised $25 million, “a record” according to his campaign team. But on Saturday, that of his tempestuous rival Donald Trump announced a figure twice as high: more than $50.5 million, collected during the fundraising evening in Palm Beach, not far from Mar-a-Lago, the luxurious residence of the Republican candidate. An amount which makes that collected by Joe Biden in New York “desperate”, in comparison, quipped the campaign team of Donald Trump. “The evening was incredible even before it started, because people wanted to contribute to a cause, to make America great again. And that's is what happened,” the former Republican president said Saturday. US President Joe Biden surrounded by his Democratic predecessors Barack Obama and Bill Clinton, March 28, 2024 in New York for a fundraising evening © AFP – Brendan Smialowski The event was organized by billionaire John Paulson, one of the few financiers to have profited from the 2008-2009 financial crisis thanks to his bets on the collapse of the real estate market. It made it possible, according to him, “to raise the highest amount in one go in the history” of politics. – 814,600 dollars – John Paulson, during a speech by Donald Trump in New York, November 12, 2019 © GETTY IMAGES NORTH AMERICA – SPENCER PLATT Guests included businessman Robert Bigelow, who made his fortune in the hotel industry before running an aerospace research company, and John Catsimatidis, owner of a major grocery store chain . Both men are known to be major donors to the Republican Party. A few former rivals of Donald Trump in the Republican primaries were also on the list: Tim Scott, Vivek Ramaswamy, Doug Burgum… These men have since completely embraced the septuagenarian's candidacy and hope to find a place in a hypothetical Trump 2.0 administration. According to the Washington Post, the seat at Donald Trump's table will be charged… 814,600 dollars. These crazy sums are used to finance the candidates' travel, to pay their teams, to order polls or, and perhaps above all, to pay for television advertisements. Joe Biden, who likes to portray himself as a hero of the middle class, hastened to criticize the event organized by his Republican opponent in a post on social networks on Saturday. “Donald Trump organizes a fundraiser with a group of world billionaires of finance, who want to slash social security and health insurance while offering themselves tax cuts,” he accused. The Democrat currently has better campaign coffers than Donald Trump, criminally charged four times, who spends part of the money on legal fees. money collected from his supporters. His team relishes this financial advantage, even calling out “broke Don” in a recent email about the billionaire himself big fan of cruel nicknames. All rights of reproduction and representation reserved. © (2024) Agence France-Presse
By Teilor Stone
Teilor Stone has been a reporter on the news desk since 2013. Before that she wrote about young adolescence and family dynamics for Styles and was the legal affairs correspondent for the Metro desk. Before joining Thesaxon , Teilor Stone worked as a staff writer at the Village Voice and a freelancer for Newsday, The Wall Street Journal, GQ and Mirabella. To get in touch, contact me through my teilor@nizhtimes.com 1-800-268-7116