Obama Swings Into LA for Fundraising Trio With ‘Star Wars’ Director J.J. Abrams, Jamie Foxx

President visits “Star Wars” director’s home on whirlwind money-raising visit to California Saturday

Barack Obama LAX 2
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President Barack Obama swooped into Los Angeles Saturday for a whirlwind day of fundraising for Democratic Party causes.

L.A. Mayor Eric Garcetti was on hand to greet the president as Air Force One touched ground at LAX at around 1 p.m. PT. From there, POTUS made his way to three back-to-back fundraisers in Los Angeles over about seven hours.

First, the president headed to a roundtable discussion at the Pacific Palisades home of “Star Wars: The Force Awakens” director J.J. Abrams and his wife, Katie McGrath. Tickets cost $33,4000 per person and benefited Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee.

From there, Obama attended a $1,000-per-person concert by Jamie Foxx at the home of Ed and Robin Berman, also in Pacific Palisades. The event, which drew Hollywood stars like Kate Hudson, benefited Obama for America and the Democratic National Committee.

The president’s final L.A. event was a roughly 50-person dinner the home of designer Michael Smith and his partner, James Costos, a former executive at HBO now serving as U.S. Ambassador to Spain. The tickets, earmarked for the Democratic Hope Fund, cost $10,000 each.

Obama was expected to leave L.A. in the evening for San Diego, where he is expected to stay until Monday.

On Saturday morning, he was in San Francisco, where he opened for a fundraising concert by Kanye West to benefit the Democratic National Committee and offered some light-hearted advice to the hip-hop mogul for his much-discussed 2020 presidential bid.


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