Trump hauls in $12 million from San Francisco’s conservative crypto bros

Donald Trump raised $12 million in a single night on Thursday as he attended an event held for him by tech venture capitalists in San Francisco intended to attract Silicon Valley’s wealthy conservative-leaning investors.

Husband-and-wife David and Jacqueline Sacks joined Chamath Palihapitiya in hosting the Republican presidential candidate and convicted felon for a reception and gala dinner at the Sacks’ home in the city’s exclusive Pacific Heights neighbourhood, according to Reuters.

Tickets for the private event went for $500,000 per couple, according to the news agency, which quotes Republican National Committeewoman Harmeet Dhillon on the night’s final fundraising total.

“President Trump is relaxed, happy, and cracking jokes about AI,” she posted on X as the event was ongoing.

Dhillon also reported that the cryptocurrency community was well represented at the gathering, with famed twins Tyler and Cameron Winklevoss in attendance and a major topic of conversation being Massachusetts Democratic Senator Elizabeth Warren “going after crypto.”

Although San Francisco remains a predominantly liberal city – where Joe Biden picked up 85 per cent of the vote in 2020 and where Kamala Harris staged her own event on Wednesday – a growing number of influential tech investors are sounding out Trump on the subject of cryptocurrency as the perception grows that the president is hostile to the sector.

The crypto industry is increasingly trying to influence Washington as it faces heightened scrutiny from regulators, especially in the wake of a wave of bankruptcies at major firms in 2022 that spooked investors, exposed fraud and misconduct and left millions of investors out of pocket.

Sacks and Palihapitiya have made no secret of their