Donald Trump Just Landed At LAX, Traffic Coming To Standstill In Downtown L.A & Beverly Hills – UPDATE

Dominic Patten

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UPDATE, 4:27 PM: Running late out of a big donor shindig in Palo Alto earlier today, Air Force One has just landed at LAX nearly an hour behind schedule.

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As Donald Trump deplanes and gets in Marine One in the next few minutes for a possibly augmented trip to DTLA before his Beverly Hills fundraiser tonight, LAPD are closing down streets all over the well heeled town and West L.A. Which means traffic is coming to a prolonged halt in many neighborhoods just as the commute home commences.

I hear that some of POTUS’ travel around the city may actually be trimmed because he was late getting to town, but that’s happening in real time and is fluid. Most likely Trump will skip heading to his downtown hotel now and whip over to the gathering at developer Geoff Palmer’s Bev Hills home.

All of which is to say, if you are not in your car by now, you might wanna hang tight for a while. In the meantime, check out the full list of road closures for Trump’s two-day visit to LA below.

BTW – Unlike when President Obama was in town for fundraisers, LA Mayor Eric Garcetti did not greet the current Commander-in-Chief at the airport. On the other hand, the Democrat and possible VP pick did post a video online on Tuesday addressing Trump and his recent comments about the alarming homelessness issue in the City of Angels:

Yep, it’s election season.

PREVIOUSLY, 9:05 AM: Donald Trump doesn’t arrive in Los Angeles on Tuesday for a series of high-roller fundraisers until 3:25 PM local time, but streets already are closed off in downtown L.A., with many more to come later on the Westside and in Beverly Hills.

Starting at 4 AM today, the LAPD put the area around Staples Center and the downtown Ritz-Carlton on lockdown in anticipation of the former Celebrity Apprentice host’s latest rich dip into the West Coast cash cookie jar.

With a Bay Area fundraiser scheduled for earlier in the day, Trump is flying in to LAX this afternoon. In a similar routine to when President Barack Obama used to frequently visit, his successor will take Marine One downtown for a brief spell before choppering back over to Santa Monica in the thick of rush hour. After landing in the boyhood town of his close adviser Stephen Miller, Trump will get in the presidential limo (aka “the Beast”) at 6 PM and tangle up streets in Beverly Hills.

Long commute story short: Avoid downtown today and leave the office or the lot fairly early in West L.A. if you don’t want to be stuck in traffic for hours. See the full list of LAPD road closures below to see what we mean.

After arriving at the $1,000- to $100,000-a-ticket event hosted by real estate developer Geoff Palmer around 7 PM, Trump is expected to press the flesh and offer up some partisan morsels to the well-heeled crowd on this leg of a multi-state campaign swing. POTUS will begin his trip back to DTLA at around 8:30 PM, taking surface streets all the way for what Secret Service estimates will be a 30-minute ride.

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Trump, who is looking to pull in north of $3 million tonight and at least another $5 million on Wednesday at his fundraisers, polls very poorly in California, but his donor cup overflows in the state once ruled figuratively and literally by Ronald Reagan. Coming the same day that Democratic candidate Beto O’Rourke is in town, 45’s latest rare visit to the Golden State is estimated to bring in about $15 million to the GOP and his 2020 campaign coffers.

Although Obama once raised $15 million in a single event at George Clooney’s pad in May 2012 for his own reelection run, former Vice President Joe Biden and the hopefuls contending for Trump’s job and the Hollywood ATM this year haven’t clinched anywhere near the kind of cash that either Obama or Trump can command.

Although conservative Hollywood names like Clint Eastwood and Mel Gibson have been tossed around in recent days as potentially showing up at Trump events, it is very unlikely that there will be significant Tinseltown presence at any of the fundraisers, including his former White House Press Secretary and now Dancing with the Stars contestant Sean Spicer. The West Coast may be fertile financial ground for the Trump 2020 re-election effort, but almost none of that money or support for the onetime Emmy nominee is coming from solidly blue Hollywood – unlike when ex-VP is Biden is in town next week for his own fundraisers.

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Having said that, resting his well-coiffed head for the night and probably sending out a few tweets mocking new-ish foe Debra Messing, Trump has a pricey breakfast gathering Wednesday before heading to San Diego for another fundraiser. The LAPD says streets in downtown will remain closed down until around noon PT Wednesday.

You have been warned.

HERE IS THE OFFICIAL ROAD CLOSURE ANNOUNCEMENT BY THE LAPD, BUT ALSO EXPECT A FEW SURPRISES:

Los Angeles & Beverly Hills: To assist the public in avoiding possible traffic congestion during the visit of the President of the United States, September 17, 2019, the following areas of Los Angeles and Beverly Hills should be avoided when possible to prevent travel delays for community members:

Tuesday, September 17, 2019

The area around N. Spring Street between S. Avenue 18 & Alpine Street
2-4 p.m.

The area around W. College Street between N. Main Street & Figueroa Terrace
2-4 p.m.

The area around Stadium Way between Lilac Terrace & Bishops Road
2-4 p.m.

The area around Wilshire Boulevard between the 110 Harbor Freeway & S. Flower Street
2-4 p.m.

The area around Wilshire Boulevard between S. Flower Street & the 110 Harbor Freeway
4-6 p.m.

The area around S. Figueroa Street between 7th Street & W. 4th Street
4-6 p.m.

The area around N. Hill Street between Bernard Street & Alpine Street
4-6 p.m.

The area around W. College Street between Yale Street & N. Main Street
4-6 p.m.

The area around N. Spring Street between Alpine Street & S. Avenue 18
4-6 p.m.

The area around Bundy Drive between Airport Avenue & W. Pico Boulevard
7-8:30 p.m.

The area around Sunset Boulevard between S. Sepulveda Boulevard & Bedford Drive (Beverly Hills)
7-8:30 p.m.

The area around Sunset Boulevard between Bedford Drive & S. Sepulveda Boulevard (Beverly Hills)
8-9 p.m.

The area around W. 9th Street between the 110 Harbor Freeway & S. Flower Street
8-9 p.m.

The area around S. Figueroa Street between Olympic Boulevard & W. 6th Street
8-9:30 p.m.

CLOSURES / RESTRICTIONS *(City of Los Angeles)

(no bus routes impacted by the hard closures)

Figueroa Street from 6th Street to 8th Street, Wilshire Boulevard from Flower Street to Beaudry Avenue, and 7th Street from Flower Street to Bixel Street will be closed beginning at 4 a.m.

The above streets will remain closed until midday September 18, 2019.

CLOSURES / RESTRICTIONS *(City of Beverly Hills)

(no bus routes impacted by the hard closures)

Sunset Boulevard between Ladera and Beverly Drives will be intermittently closed between
5-9 p.m.

[Suggested alternative east/west routes: Santa Monica, Wilshire and Olympic Boulevards]

Benedict Canyon Drive between Sunset Boulevard and Mulholland Drive will be intermittently closed between 5-9 p.m.

[Suggested alternate north/south route: Coldwater Canyon Drive]

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