President Trump will be visiting the Bay Area, Beverly Hills, and San Diego this week to raise money for his re-election campaign and the Republican National Committee.
The Bay Area fundraiser is scheduled for Sept. 17 at a location that is yet to be disclosed. The lunch event will be hosted by RNC chairwoman Ronna McDaniel, co-chair Tommy Hicks Jr., RNC Finance Chairman Todd Ricketts and Trump campaign manager Brad Parscale.
Trump will then attend a dinner in Beverly Hills before heading to Los Angeles for breakfast the following morning. Later that day, Trump will arrive in San Diego for another fundraising luncheon. Tickets for the events reportedly range between $1,000 and $100,000. Attendees who opt for the highest ticket price will receive a photo opportunity with the President as well as access to a VIP reception.
In a Sept. 5 tweet, the President pointed out that Messing “wants to create a ‘Blacklist’ of Trump supporters, & is being accused of McCarthyism.” Trump also pointed out the double-standard at play, speculating that “If Roseanne Barr said what [Messing] did, even being on a much higher rated show, she would have been thrown off television. Will Fake News NBC allow a McCarthy style Racist to continue?”
The accusation of racism stems from the fact that Messing “liked” a photo of a church sign that referred to black Trump supporters as “mentally ill” — a move that led to the trending hashtag #RacistDebraMessing. Messing has apologized on Twitter for liking the church sign: “I said I regret it.”
McCormack has since attempted to backtrack from his initial call for a blacklist, stating, “I absolutely do not support blacklists or discrimination of any kind.” Messing shared McCormack’s clarification, commenting that “I couldn’t have said it better.”
In a rare instance of mutual agreement, President Trump’s criticism of Messing and McCormack’s call for a blacklist was echoed by outspoken liberal Whoopi Goldberg during a heated exchange with fellow panelists Joy Behar and Sunny Hostin on The View.
“The last time people did this” it did not go well, Goldberg said. “People ended up killing themselves. This is not a good idea. We had something called a blacklist, and a lot of really good people were accused of stuff. Nobody cared whether it was true or not. They were accused. And they lost their right to work.”
“In this country,” she continued, “people can vote for who they want to. That is one of the great rights of this country. You don’t have to like it, but we don’t go after people because we don’t like who they voted for.”
The mid-September fundraisers will mark Trump’s first visit to California since April, when the President came to Los Angeles to raise money and examine renovations of the border wall. Trump’s visit to California will occur about a week before the Emmy’s take place and Democratic hopeful Joe Biden visits Hollywood for a fundraiser of his own.
