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Joe Biden, Barack Obama And Jimmy Kimmel Warn Of Another Donald Trump Term; Star-Filled L.A. Fundraiser Expected To Raise At Least $30 Million — Update
UPDATED: President Joe Biden‘s star-filled fundraiser in Los Angeles — in which he took part in a conversation with former President Barack Obama and Jimmy Kimmel — is now expected to raise at least $30 million, according to a source close to the campaign.
During the roughly 40-minute sit down, Biden, Obama and Kimmel touted the current administration’s accomplishments, but a good part of the talk was devoted to warnings about another Trump term and even bafflement at the way that the former Celebrity Apprentice host has shattered so many political and institutional norms.
Biden said that “one of the scariest parts” of another Donald Trump is that he would likely have the ability to appoint two more Supreme Court nominees.
“The Supreme Court has never been as out of kilter as it is today,” Biden said. “…The fact of the matter is that this has never been a court that has been this far out of step.”
He noted that when the Dobbs decision was issued overturning Roe vs. Wade, Justice Clarence Thomas wrote that other decisions should be reconsidered, including IVF and contraception. Someone in the audience then shouted, “Gay rights.”
“By the way, not on my watch. Not on my watch,” said Biden, in a line that got one of the biggest cheers from the crowd in the 7,100-seat Peacock Theater.
Before Kimmel introduced the two presidents, he showed a video of Trump from 2020, where he predicted that if he was not elected, major holidays like the Fourth of July and Christmas would end. Kimmel had asked the president, “Is it satisfying to see that video to see how wrong Orange Julius Caesar was about your presidency?”At the outset, Biden wasted little time making a biting about Donald Trump shortly after he took the stage.
“I could have done nothing and done better than he was doing,” Biden.
The ABC late night host then went into a long list of Biden’s accomplishments, often interspersing them with irreverent quips.
Kimmel later noted that Biden said he was “fighting to restore the soul of America and lately it seems like we might need and exorcism. Is that why you visited the Pope?”
Biden laughed and said, “The truth is the way in which we communicate with people these days, there’s so much opportunity to just lie….If you have just one source you go to for your news, it’s just easy to convince people that that is the only truth that’s out there.”
Obama referred to Trump’s recent conviction, telling the audience that “Part of what has happened over the last several years is we have normalized behavior that used to be disqualifying. We have the spectacle of the nominee of one of the two major parties sitting in court and being convicted by a jury of his peers on 34 counts. His foundation is not allowed to operate because it was engaging in money business and not actually philanthropic work. You have his organization being prosecuted for not paying taxes. … There are certain standards and values that we should all abide by. Joe Biden has stood for those values and continues to do, and the other guy doesn’t.”
At times during the conversation, Biden tried out some of his own humor. With Trump and Biden neck and neck in the polls, Kimmel at one point asked, “Is this country suffering from Trump amnesia? Why do so many Americans seem to remember the Trump administration the same way we do a colonoscopy, like we know what happened. “
Biden responded, “All they got to do is remember what it was like. Remember the pandemic? He said, ‘Don’t worry. Just inject a little bleach in your body.”
“That worked for me, by the way,” Kimmel quipped. “Fair is fair.”
Biden then quipped, “By the way, it worked for him. It colored his hair.”
The event, which also featured celebrities such as George Clooney, Julia Roberts and Barbra Streisand, was being touted as the largest Democratic fundraiser ever. The sum is higher than a similar celebrity-filled event the campaign held at Radio City Music Hall in New York in March, when $26 million was raised.
The Biden campaign has been marketing the star-studded event for weeks, with supporters being offered a chance to win a trip to attend and meet some of those on the bill. “It’s amazing how many people will show up to an event when you send 5,000 emails reminding them about it,” Kimmel quipped.
Jill Biden also spoke, introduced by Streisand, who said that the first lady is “the neighbor everyone wishes they have, not the type who suddenly flies an American flag upside down.”
“Trump has told told us again and again why he wants the White House — to give himself absolute power,” the first lady said.
Among the thousands attending the event were industry figures including Damon Lindelof, Marta Kauffman, CAA’s Bryan Lourd and Craig Gering, Kathy Griffin and Jim Gianopoulos, as well as politicos including Governor Gavin Newsom and Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass, among a group of lawmakers participating in a photo line with Biden and Obama. Also at the theater: Los Angeles City Councilman Kevin de Leon.
As expected, there was a heavy police presence, with loud pro-Palestinian protesters gathered on Olympic Boulevard. Demonstrators have tried to block entrances at previous Biden fundraisers, including a Holmby Hills event in December. Protesters disrupted the Radio City event at points, but it went on as scheduled.
Also appearing at the Los Angeles event were Sista Strings (singing “Lift Every Voice”), The Silhouettes, Sheryl Lee Ralph (singing a rousing rendition of “God Bless America”), Jason Bateman and Kathryn Hahn. Jack Black wore stars and stripes overalls over a Dark Brandon T-shirt.
Republicans tried to turn their tables on the expected Trump bashing at the fundraiser. Jessica Millan Patterson, chair of the California Republican Party, said in a statement on Friday, “Democrat presidents have long had expectations of a warm welcome from Californians, but unfortunately for President Biden, his own actions and failed agenda – from rampant inflation to an open border and detrimental foreign policy – have deprived him of that reality. No amount of Hollywood magic or celebrity cameos can disguise the fact that Joe Biden is a failed president who will be retired by voters once and for all this November.”
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One person killed in Maine in second fatal ICE-involved shooting in less than a week | CNN
A person was killed Monday in an ICE-involved shooting in Biddeford, Maine, according to the state’s speaker of the house — just days after a federal agent fatally shot a Mexican immigrant during a traffic stop in Houston, sparking mass protests and demands for transparency and accountability.
“A person was killed. ICE was involved. State Police and the Department of Public Safety are now on scene to gather details and would expect the FBI to investigate as well,” Maine House Speaker Ryan Fecteau said in a statement on Facebook. “These are the details that I have at this time. I will provide further updates, as they are relayed to me.”
CNN has reached out to Immigration and Customs Enforcement and the Department of Homeland Security for comment.
Biddeford police told CNN there was a “police incident” in the area, about 18 miles south of Portland, and said there is no threat to the public at this time, but declined to provide additional details.
Maine Democratic US Rep. Chellie Pingree said she was “disturbed and angry” upon hearing the news of the shooting. She called for an investigation into the incident, adding a question directed at ICE officers: “Why are you in Maine?”
The incident comes less than a week after a man on his way to work in Houston was shot and killed by an ICE agent. Lorenzo Salgado Araujo was killed during a traffic stop in what ICE initially described as a targeted enforcement operation, though a source later said Salgado Araujo was not the target of the operation.
The shooting has reignited calls for accountability among ICE agents, which reached a fever pitch earlier this year after 37-year-old mother Renee Good and 37-year-old ICU nurse Alex Pretti were killed by federal immigration agents during the Trump administration’s operation in Minneapolis.
The administration dubbed a similar surge in immigration enforcement across Maine in January “Operation Catch of the Day.” The ACLU and other advocates filed a lawsuit against federal immigration agents for “abducting a lawful immigrant” during the surge.
Some community groups and advocates that rallied against the surge earlier this year have already started to organize in response to Monday’s shooting. The group “Maine Resists” has planned an emergency community rally in the city at noon. The racial justice and immigrant rights group Project Relief said it is in touch with the victim’s family.
This is a developing story and will be updated.
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Want to own a real T. rex? It could cost you $30 million
“Gus,” a Tyrannosaurus rex skeleton, is pictured during a press preview at Sotheby’s in New York City on July 1.
Timothy A. Clary/AFP via Getty Images
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Timothy A. Clary/AFP via Getty Images
If you ever wanted to own an actual T. rex and not just a toy, you now have a chance. But it’s going to cost you some bones. Millions of them.
The Tyrannosaurus rex fossil known as “Gus” will go up for auction Tuesday morning at Sotheby’s New York City office. The starting bid for the dinosaur is $19 million and the auction house estimates it could sell for $20 to $30 million.
Gus was found in Harding County, S.D., on private land in 2021, according to Sotheby’s. The T. rex skeleton, which is 38 feet long and 12 and half feet tall, is believed to be from the late Cretaceous period from about 67 million years ago.

“Judging from the overall size and degree of bone development it can be determined that Gus’ skeleton belonged to a very large, robust, adult individual,” the auction house said in the listing.
Thomas Heitkamp, president of Theropoda Expeditions, the company that excavated the site, said in a Sotheby’s video about the discovery that nearly a thousand pieces were collected.
The creature is named after the owner of the ranch where it was discovered, Gary “Gus” Licking. He died during the excavation process, which ran through 2023, and was not able to see Gus fully assembled, according to Cassandra Hatton of Sotheby’s.
“Gary had for years roamed around his 6,500 acre property and seeing T. rex teeth and little bits of fossils and such, and he realized that there was probably something really important under the ground,” Hatton said in the video.

Gus is one of the largest and most complete T. rex specimens ever found, according to Sotheby’s.
It’s not the first time dinosaur bones have been for sale to the highest bidder.
The first auction for a dinosaur was held by Sotheby’s in 1997. The creature, a T. rex named Sue, was purchased by a few large companies for the Field Museum in Chicago. It went for $8.4 million.
In 2024, Apex the stegosaurus sold for $44.6 million, the most ever for a dinosaur fossil. It was purchased by billionaire investor Ken Griffin, who loaned it to the American Natural History Museum in New York for four years.
Paleontologist Scott Persons, who is the curator of natural history at the South Carolina State Museum, says dinosaurs fetching tens of millions of dollars reflects an “increase in market demand.”
“More and more dinosaurs are being sold this way and at ridiculous prices,” he says in an email to NPR.
He says people who can afford to spend this much on an auction could do more to support further research.
“A sum like that could endow a research program at a public museum of your choosing,” he says. “That would pay for a career’s worth of fieldwork, the discovery of whole new species, and the public exhibition of the findings.”
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Map: 4.1-Magnitude Earthquake Shakes Southern California
Note: Map shows the area with a shake intensity of 3 or greater, which U.S.G.S. defines as “weak,” though the earthquake may be felt outside the areas shown. The New York Times
A light, 4.1-magnitude earthquake struck in Southern California on Sunday, according to the United States Geological Survey.
The temblor happened at 3:38 a.m. Pacific time about 1 mile southeast of Frazier Park, Calif., data from the agency shows.
U.S.G.S. data earlier reported that the magnitude was 4.4.
As seismologists review available data, they may revise the earthquake’s reported magnitude. Additional information collected about the earthquake may also prompt U.S.G.S. scientists to update the shake-severity map.
Subsequent quakes have been reported in the same area. Such temblors are typically aftershocks caused by minor adjustments along the portion of a fault that slipped at the time of the initial earthquake.
Aftershocks detected
Quakes and aftershocks within 100 miles
Aftershocks can occur days, weeks or even years after the first earthquake. These events can be of equal or larger magnitude to the initial earthquake, and they can continue to affect already damaged locations.
The New York Times When quakes and aftershocks occurred
Sources: United States Geological Survey (epicenter, aftershocks, shake intensity); LandScan via Oak Ridge National Laboratory (population density) | Notes: Shaking categories are based on the Modified Mercalli Intensity scale. When aftershock data is available, the corresponding maps and charts include earthquakes within 100 miles and seven days of the initial quake. All times above are Pacific time. Shake data is as of Sunday, July 12 at 11:54 a.m. Eastern. Aftershocks data is as of Sunday, July 12 at 2:24 p.m. Eastern.
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