Former President of US Barack Obama helped raise $11 million for White House hopeful Joe Biden during a Tuesday virtual fundraiser and said a “great awakening” among Americans could help defeat Donald Trump in November’s election.
According to the Biden press secretary TJ Ducklo said that the two-term Democrat proved a major draw, bringing in a substantial audience and raising over $11 million in total, making it the most successful finance event of the entire campaign.
Taking to Twitter, Ducklo said, “Some $7.6 million of that came from 175,000 grassroots donors, who continue to power this campaign every single day,”
The former president said, “I am here to say the help is on the way if we do the work, because there’s nobody I trust more to be able to heal this country and get back on track than my dear friend Joe Biden”.
“What makes me optimistic is the fact that there is a great awakening going on around the country, particularly among younger people” who are “fed up with the shambolic, disorganized, mean-spirited approach to governance that we’ve seen over the last couple of years”, Obama added.
In response to it, Biden agreed with Obama’s remarks on political change. He also suggested world leaders have grown weary of Trump, saying “they’re desperately, desperately waiting for American leadership.”
Biden has effectively been his party’s leader since his last challenger in the Democratic primary, Bernie Sanders, ended his campaign in April.
The Democratic National Committee earlier postponed the party’s presidential nominating convention in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, to August 17, the week before the Republican Party’s convention, scheduled for August 24 to 27 in Charlotte, North Carolina.
Earlier, Trump’s re-election campaign said in a statement that Biden has “had to adopt most of Bernie’s agenda” — policies that Trump has branded socialist.
But in a series of polls conducted in April, Biden leads Trump in head-to-head general election matchups by an average of 5.9 percent, according to the RealClearPolitics website.
In April, Obama posted a video on Twitter in which he talked about Biden’s leadership and said “That’s why I’m so proud to endorse Joe Biden for president of the United States”.
The former president further said, “Choosing Joe to be my vice president was one of the best decisions I ever made, and he became a close friend”.
In May, Biden and the Democratic Party raised nearly $81 million, 10 percent more than Trump, although the president has more overall campaign cash.
The 2020 US presidential election is scheduled for Tuesday, November 3.
(With inputs from agency)