Trump Event Raises $6 Million For Veterans, GOP Frontrunner Gives $1 Million Of His Own Money

The Trump event in Iowa that took the place of the GOP frontrunner’s seventh debate appearance has raised more than $6 million so far, according to the man himself.

Donald Trump addressed supporters at the tail end of the event and announced the final tally. Earlier in the night, he read off a list of names along with their sizable donations.

Among them, Carl Icahn, who gave $500,000, an anonymous donor who gave $1 million, and Donald Trump, who contributed an additional $1 million.

Also, the DonaldTrumpForVets website, which is broken at the time of this post, presumably from bandwidth overreach, appeared long enough to show $430,000 in additional revenues that were raised throughout the day.

The Trump event itself was visited by rival candidates — using that term loosely since they were on the Fox News undercard debate — Mike Huckabee and Rick Santorum, whose presence was announced earlier today by the New York Times.

Most of the Trump event — live-streamed on the CBS News website — had a positive, pro-veteran vibe with very little speaking being done by the GOP frontrunner.

Instead, a number of veterans spoke on healthcare issues — both mental and physical — that veterans face after returning from combat.

There was one part of the evening that took a negative turn. Near the event’s conclusion, Trump took the stage with two female African-American supporters, Diamond and Silk, who rose to prominence with “Stump for Trump” videos, and their time was interrupted by a protester.

https://youtu.be/jFmb7rKAtJ0

It was difficult on the live feed to hear and see what the protester had to say, but they were shouted down with chants of “Trump!” by those in attendance.

One of the women said that supporters of the other candidates feel like they have to crash Trump’s rallies because “theirs are so boring!” That drew enormous applause.

Another portion of the Trump event heavy on applause was the speech given by Green Beret hero and amputee John Wayne Walding. He and representatives from the 22kill website presented Trump with a special ring at the ceremony’s conclusion for hosting the fundraising event.

While “the Donald” didn’t refrain from taking shots at the GOP debate running simultaneously with his event, his comments were mostly about how much better it was to be “helping veterans than debating” — a low-profile technique that was somewhat the opposite of what he’s been doing on Twitter in the lead-up to Thursday night’s contest.

Prior to this, he had heavily attacked moderator Megyn Kelly, who accused him of sexist remarks at the first Fox News debate.

On two occasions, he pulled out the word “bimbo” as seen below.

“@gene70: @FireFlyFury @megynkelly @realDonaldTrump And this is the bimbo that’s asking presidential questions? pic.twitter.com/oU1uUGnuWb”

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 28, 2016

On the day of the debate, CNN reports, Fox News head Roger Ailes had reportedly called Trump and asked him to reconsider his decision to no-show the debate.

A statement from Fox News, per Mediaite, said that the candidate told them he would go to the debate instead of the rally if Fox donated $5 million to a charitable cause of Trump’s choosing.

While Donald said that Ailes “begged” him to do the debate, the Fox story is somewhat different, mentioning “three brief conversations… about possibly appearing at the debate.”

The statement continued.

“In the course of those conversations, we acknowledged his concerns about a satirical observation we made in order to quell the attacks on Megyn Kelly, and prevent her from being smeared any further. Furthermore, Trump offered to appear at the debate upon the condition that FOX News contribute $5 million to his charities. We explained that was not possible and we could not engage in a quid pro quo, nor could any money change hands for any reason. In the last 48 hours, we’ve kept two issues at the forefront — we would never compromise our journalistic standards and we would always stand by our journalist, Megyn Kelly. We have accomplished those two goals and we are pleased with the outcome. We’re very proud to have her on stage as a debate moderator alongside Bret Baier & Chris Wallace.”

Do you think the Trump event was better for Donald Trump’s campaign than doing the debate, and will the $6 million fundraising effort help him win the military vote? Sound off in the comments section.

[Image via Trump event screen grab]