Former U.S. president and Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump raised $12 million at an event in San Francisco on Thursday, June 6th. The event, organized by two tech venture capitalists, attracted many Silicon Valley investors.
According to Harmeet Dhillon, a member of the Republican National Committee, the fundraising event yielded approximately $12 million. The event was hosted by David Sacks and his wife Jacqueline, co-founders of the venture capital fund Craft Ventures, as well as prominent investor Chamath Palihapitiya at the Sacks’ luxurious mansion.
Dhillon mentioned on social media platform X that the Sacks’ and Jacqueline’s lavish estate was packed with guests, including executives from cryptocurrency exchange platform Coinbase, the Winklevoss twins who are cryptocurrency investors, and other cryptocurrency leaders.
According to Reuters citing sources familiar with the matter, tickets for the fundraiser event were selling for up to $500,000 per couple and have sold out.
In the 2020 election, the Democratic candidate Joe Biden won 85% of the vote in the city, defeating then-President Trump. However, increasingly more well-known local venture capitalists and cryptocurrency investors are expressing their support for Trump.
Last week, Biden vetoed a resolution proposed by Congress, stating that he believed the resolution, introduced by the Republicans, would “inappropriately limit the Securities and Exchange Commission’s ability to establish appropriate regulations and address future issues related to cryptocurrency assets.”
According to Trevor Traina, a former U.S. ambassador to Austria in the Trump administration and a tech executive in San Francisco, the commercial regulations implemented by the Biden administration have alienated some in the tech industry.
Traina commented on Biden’s veto of the resolution, saying, “This could be the last domino.”
Jacob Helberg, a senior policy advisor at data analytics provider Palantir Technologies, stated that he recently donated about $1 million to Trump’s campaign.
Helberg said, “In 2016, the only person I knew in Silicon Valley supporting Trump was Peter.” He was referring to Peter Thiel, co-founder of Palantir and a conservative venture capitalist.
“Now, I’ve counted dozens, even more supporters. In the past six months, we’ve seen the situation start to spiral out of control,” he added.
Despite Trump’s conviction last week, major Republican donors continue to support him and have pledged to provide millions of dollars in support for the first U.S. president to be convicted of a high crime. Trump’s campaign fundraising has reached a historic high, with the San Francisco event successfully boosting his campaign funds.