US President Donald Trump shakes Ike Perlmutter, CEO of Marvel Entertainment, hand before signing an executive order on the US Department of Veterans Affairs April 27, 2017 in Washington, DC.
Brendan Smialowski | AFP | Getty Images
Ike Perlmutter, the previous chairman of Marvel Entertainment at Disney, is planning a key donation to back former President Donald Trump’s 2024 run for president, in keeping with his spokesman.
Perlmutter has yet to make a decision how much he plans to donate toward Trump’s run, however the businessman’s spokesman said Thursday the financial support could be “meaningful.”
Perlmutter and Trump have been close for over twenty years. Perlmutter has previously donated $10.5 million toward a pro-Trump super PAC throughout the 2020 election cycle, in keeping with Federal Election Commission records. Perlmutter’s wife also gave $10.5 million to the identical PAC, records show.
Perlmutter also acted as an out of doors advisor to then-President Trump on issues related to the Department of Veterans Affairs, according to ProPublica.
The previous Marvel boss, who has a net price of just over $3 billion, is up to now one in all the wealthiest backers of Trump’s 2020 campaign. Many megadonors who once supported the ex-president are in search of alternatives following the Jan. 6, 2021 pro-Trump riot on Capitol Hill and a few lackluster 2022 midterm election results.
The Trump-allied Make America Great Again super PAC will likely receive money from Perlmutter. The super PAC got here into this yr with just over $54 million available and up to now has spent over $19 million on TV and digital ads.
Trump is currently leading within the Republican primary polls, well ahead of his second place rival in Florida Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis.
Perlmutter’s decision to back Trump again over his Republican rivals could represent one other blow to DeSantis. Among the governor’s donors turn out to be concerned with the trajectory of his campaign. Perlmutter donated over $250,000 to a state-level PAC that backed when he ran for governor in 2018 and 2022, in keeping with campaign finance records. His wife gave over $2 million to the identical pro-DeSantis PAC, in keeping with the records.
The Latest York Times reported that Perlmutter recently dined with fellow GOP candidate Vivek Ramaswamy.
Perlmutter, after he was ousted from Disney earlier this yr, told The Wall Street Journal that he called DeSantis and agreed that the corporate shouldn’t be involved with politics. “Ron, you are right. Disney doesn’t have the best to get entangled with politics,” Perlmutter reportedly told DeSantis in a phone call. Disney and DeSantis have been at war for the reason that entertainment giant last yr criticized a Republican-supported bill that critics call “Don’t Say Gay.”
Perlmutter told the Journal that Disney fired him as chairman of Marvel Entertainment because he pushed the corporate too aggressively to chop costs and bumped into issues with executives allied with newly returned CEO Bob Iger.
A Disney representative told the Journal that the corporate’s general counsel called Perlmutter to tell him that his job was terminated due to the company’s broader cost-cutting effort. Perlmutter told the publication he doesn’t remember such a call happening.
Iger told CNBC on Thursday that he rejected DeSantis’ campaign rhetoric against the corporate, calling the Republican presidential candidate’s attacks “preposterous and inaccurate.” Iger also said there shall be a pullback in content spending and creation for the Star Wars and Marvel franchises.
