President Donald Trump mixed reelection business with pleasure during a weekend stop at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida, attending a fundraiser on Saturday evening expected to raise USD 10 million for his campaign and the Republican National Committee.
The event was believed to be his most expensive fundraiser ever, with invitations going to donors who gave $580,600 per couple, according to The Washington Post, which obtained an invitation to the event at the Palm Beach estate of billionaire investor Nelson Peltz. Pro-Trump groups have been shattering fundraising records on the path toward a goal of raising $1 billion this election cycle.
Advocacy groups that have sought campaign finance reform said the Supreme Court paved the way for such fundraising hauls by striking down in 2014 the limit on the total amount of money an individual could give to all political party committees in a two-year election cycle.
“The ability of Trump to raise these astronomical amounts of influence money from billionaires and multimillionaires is a direct result of the Supreme Court’s utter failure to understand the nation’s campaign finance laws or the implications of its decision,” said Democracy 21 President Fred Wertheimer in an op-ed published in Medium.
In that 5-4 decision the Supreme Court found that limits on the total amount of money donors can give to all candidates, committees and political parties were unconstitutional.
Sen Bernie Sanders has criticized some of his fellow Democratic presidential candidates for accepting campaign donations from the extremely wealthy, questioning whether those who accept the donations would stand up to those who provide them if the situation called for it. AP
Baghdad: Multiple rockets hit an Iraqi base hosting American troops near the US embassy early Sunday, the latest in a flurry of attacks against US assets in the country.
“The Coalition confirms small rockets impacted the Iraqi base hosting (coalition) troops in the International Zone... No casualties,” said coalition spokesman Myles Caggins.
That base, known as Union III, is the headquarters for the US-led coalition, deployed in Iraq since 2014 to help local troops fight the Islamic State jihadist group.
Iraq’s military said three Katyusha rockets hit inside the Green Zone, the high-security enclave where the US mission and Union III are located, as well as Iraqi government buildings, United Nations offices and other embassies.
A fourth rocket hit a logistics base in a different neighbourhood operated by the Hashed al-Shaabi, a military network officially incorporated into the Iraqi state, the Iraqi military said.
There was no immediate statement from the Hashed.
Strikes on assets of both the US and Hashed at the same time are unusual, as Washington has blamed hardline elements within the military network for repeated rocket attacks on American installations across Iraq.
Sunday’s was the 19th attack since October to target either the embassy or the roughly 5,200 US troops stationed alongside local forces across Iraq.
No group has claimed responsibility for any of the incidents. In late December, a rocket attack on the northern Iraqi base of K1 left one US contractor dead and unleashed a dramatic series of events.
Washington responded with retaliatory strikes against Kataeb Hezbollah, a hardline Hashed faction in western Iraq.
Days later, an American drone strike in Baghdad killed top Iranian general Qasem Soleimani and his right-hand man, Hashed deputy chief Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis.
Hashed factions have vowed revenge for the pair’s death but said they would prioritise a political objective first: the withdrawal of US troops from Iraq.
But the network includes a broad range of groups and some have appeared more willing to harass US troops militarily. Sunday’s attack came just hours after one of the Hashed’s Iran-backed factions, Harakat al-Nujaba, announced a “countdown” to ousting American forces from the country.
A top leader within Nujaba, Nasr al-Shammary, tweeted a photograph of what he claimed was an American military vehicle, adding: “We are closer than you think.”
Sunday’s assault sent warning sirens blaring across the diplomatic compound, a US military source and a Western diplomat based nearby told AFP. AFP’s correspondents heard multiple strong explosions followed by aircraft circling near the Green Zone.