President Joe Biden is set to visit San Francisco, Los Altos Hills and Los Angeles this week, hitting up California’s deep-pocketed Democratic donors in the ramp-up to his impending rematch against former President Trump.
Among Biden’s stops is a fundraiser at the home of Robert and Danielle Klein in Los Altos Hills on Thursday, the Los Angeles Times reports. Former State Controller and venture capitalist Steve Westly will co-host the event. Tickets start at $6,600 and go up to $100,000 for hosts, $50,000 for co-hosts and $25,000 for an “advocate,” The Hill reported.
Robert Klein manages a $7 billion real-estate development company, with major investments from CalPERS, California’s Public Employee Pension Fund. Klein also led ballot initiatives in 2004 and 2020 to create a new state stem-cell agency, funding it with $8.5 billion in funds borrowed from the state.
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Planning for two other events in San Francisco is also under way, sources told The Times. Biden will also make an appearance in Los Angeles on Tuesday for an event at the home of Haim Saban, an Israeli-American media mogul who made it big with the “Power Rangers” franchise.
So far, Biden has out-raised Trump in the run-up to the November presidential election. As of the end of 2023, Biden had $46 million in campaign funds on hand, versus $33 million for the former president.
Biden has made repeated visits to the Bay Area to tap the region’s Democrat-friendly investors and tech executives. In September, he attended fundraisers held by financier Mark Heising and Liz Simons, as well as Democratic fundraiser Gretchen Sisson, wife of Facebook co-founder Andrew McCollum. And in November, while Joe Biden was attending the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum in San Francisco, First Lady Jill Biden campaigned on her husband’s behalf at the Atherton home of philanthropists Doug and Lisa Goldman. That same week, California Gov. Gavin Newsom hosted an event alongside commercial real estate developer Clint Reilly and his wife at the Merchants Exchange building in San Francisco.