President Barack Obama’s re-election campaign today got yet more Hollywood fundraising help. Young stars like Jared Leto, Big Bang Theory’s Johnny Galecki and Oliva Wilde have joined with a few more established figures like David Fincher, Darren Aronofsky and Peter Frampton for what is being called a “Gen44″ fundraiser on June 29 here in LA. This will be the fifth time the Obama campaign has reached into Hollywood’s starpower pockets since raising a record-breaking $15 million at George Clooney’s house on May 10.
Leto chairs the Gen44 host committee with Galecki, Wilde, Fincher, Aronofsky, Frampton, Maria Bello, Zach Braff, former Friday Night Lights star Connie Britton, Sophia Bush, The Game author Neil Strauss, and Jim Toth among those on board. Several of the committee members, like Leto and Braff, met quietly with the President the last time he was in LA fundraising on June 7.
The campaign announcement today made no mention whether President Obama, the First Lady or anyone else from the administration would attend. All that is known is that the event is at 9 PM on June 29 in LA and that tickets are $500 each for attendees and $2,500 each for Host Committee members like Leto and Galecki. That’s considerably cheaper than the $40,000 a ticket intimate dinner at Clooney’s house last month. It is also cheaper than the $40,000 per couple tickets for the June 6 event at Glee creator Ryan Murphy’s Beverly Hills home or the June 14 dinner at Sarah Jessica Parker’s New York brownstone. Ticket prices for the June 29 Gen44 fundraiser are also less than the $1,250 it cost to attend the LGBT Leadership Council Gala at the Beverly Wilshire on June 7 and far less than the $10,000 a ticket it cost to go to the Mariah Carey hosted gala at the Plaza Hotel in New York on June 14. There is no word if there will be a small donor lotto at the June 29 event like there was at the Clooney and Parker dinners.
With donations from Wall Street to Obama substantially down from what they were in 2008 and soaring conservative donations in the wake of the Supreme Court’s 2010 Citizens United ruling, there’s a lot more Hollywood fundraising from the incumbent this election. Speaking on background to a gathering of Washington, D.C.-based reporters, Obama officials predicted a $1 billion combined anti-Obama effort from Republican super PACs, nonprofit entities and the Romney campaign itself. The presumptive Republican nominee alone, they predicted, would raise more than $100 million in June — a sum that would be both historic and demoralizing to Democrats, who went into the 2012 election expecting the president to retain his 2008 fundraising advantages.
The full Gen44 host committee is Jared Leto, Johnny Galecki, Olivia Wilde, David Fincher, Darren Aronofsky, Peter Frampton, Steve Aoki, Donovan Leitch, Allan Loeb, Samantha Millman, Maggie Q, Maria Bello, Zach Braff, Pete Wentz, Connie Britton, David Morin, Jason Weinberg, Beau Flynn, Jodi Gomes, Chris Hanley, Eric Ortner, Catherine Park Jason Putorti, Jordan Brown, Sophia Bush, Maegan Carberry, Pankit Doshi, Chris Kantrowitz Todd Hawkins, Zachary Quinto, Ian, Somerhalder, Neil Strauss, Jim Toth, Kenna, Marc Webb and Pat Magnarella.
Deadline's Dominic Patten - tip him here.


A-ha! The Fundraiser-In-Chief strikes again!
Gosh. You know, Mitt Romney doesn’t spend any time fundraising…
Mitt Romney doesn’t have a job to do right now, President Obama does.
LOL. You probably believe Mitt Romney when he said in 2011 that he’s “also unemployed” despite making $45 million in 2010 and 2011.
News flash: all presidents campaign for reelection … even George Bush did. How many vacation days did Bush take again? Yeah, that’s what I thought. Don’t see you complaining about that. LOL.
Oh the double standard. The amount of Bush vacations probably don’t even add to the number that Obama took in the last three years. And Romney isn’t resorting to professional pretenders to “rile up the youth of America” even though most of the actors that attended this so-called secret meeting were above the age of 25.
Now I really hope the other guy wins….this one with all the fundraisers..one after the other after the other..tone it down already!
Perhaps you didn’t read the part of the article that Mitt and the GOP will be raising over $100 million in June. It certainly makes it easier to raise that kind of money when it is coming from billionaires who, like Adelson and his Macau casino money, will personally cut checks for $10 million for a candidate he doesn’t even like.
Where else can Obama go to raise money and make friends?
All presidential candidates have to raise $$, but the relentless way this guy does it, and his pathological obsession with hanging out with Hollywood celebs, and the clueless way he always seems to arrive LA at rush hour and shut down the whole city while he fills his sack o’cash at some tony manse….all of this has done more to cheapen the presidency than anything his predecessors ever did, and that includes the Clintons’ cheesy selling of the Lincoln Bedroom. The ony good news is, voters are paying attention.
Seriously, this guy should be running for Mayor of Hollywood, not president. I guess all the brain dead celebs just love the high unemployment, record debt, cratering home values, etc. These have to be the most clueless people on the planet. I guess they still think Obama is “cool.” Maybe…if you think tanking the country into the toilet is cool. Connie Britton is the biggest disappointment on this list…I figured her for a smarter lady.
CM…you’re advertising your ignorance. Unemployment skyrocketed, and home values plunged, PRIOR to Obama’s presidency. Each category has improved since then. So, like, who are you really angry at? Or, I should say, who should you really be angry at? Get a grip.
The Hollywood crowd should start wearing Black & White ribbons since their latest cause is to preserve an endangered President.
I haven’t commented on these fundraisers before, but it does seem to be getting a little desperate, and seems like the “celebrities” are getting more and more low-rent each time. I mean – Jared Leto and Pete Wentz? What next, Barry schmoozing with Corey Feldman and Todd Bridges?
Who the heck are you to be calling anyone (especially Jared Leto) low rent? You obviously don’t have a clue.
Well if Jared Leto and Sophia Bush are supporting Obama then clearly I must take this candidate seriously. The intelligentsia have spoken!
Fifth time to LA since May. Johnny Galecki hosting his fundraiser. The President and Cheese must be getting really desperate. I wonder what his blue collar constituency back home in the Mid West think of all of this.
I can only speak for myself and say I don’t like it.
Bring moi a doggy bag!!
The President is playing by the rules that the system created long before he was born. I still remember Reagan hanging out with Bob Hope at fundraisers.
People who hate Obama will find any excuse to put their hate in. Today it’s his fundraising.
I’d have more respect for you all if you just admitted your hatred for the president, instead of pretending it’s because of this or that.
Sheldon Alderson just wrote a TEN MILLION DOLLAR CHECK for romney and his car elevator corrupt cronies.
but it won’t matter. romney will lose. because there are still enough people who know a pandering hypocrite who talks out of both sides of his mouth when they see one.
>> because there are still enough people who know a pandering hypocrite who talks out of both sides of his mouth when they see one.
You’re talking about Obama, oh so enlightened one. Your Golden Boy can’t do no wrong . . . that’s what I’m getting from your entire post.
Hoping to see Fred Willard and Johnny Galecki hosting the next Obama fundraising dinner.