Booker taps Obama’s Greenwich donor network

Newark Mayor Cory Booker announces his plans to run for the U.S. Senate seat that opened with the death of Frank Lautenberg (D-N.J.) in Newark, N.J. on Saturday, June 8, 2013. Booker, 44, is currently serving in his second term as mayor. (AP Photo/Rich Schultz)

Newark Mayor Cory Booker announces his plans to run for the U.S. Senate seat that opened with the death of Frank Lautenberg (D-N.J.) in Newark, N.J. on Saturday, June 8, 2013. Booker, 44, is currently serving in his second term as mayor. (AP Photo/Rich Schultz)

A former community organizer with an Ivy League pedigree and grand political ambitions is about to make a large withdrawal from Greenwich’s political ATM.

And we’re not talking about Barack Obama.

The favorite to win a special election for the seat of the late Sen. Frank Lautenberg, D-N.J., Newark Mayor Cory Booker will add to his impressive war chest at a $1,000 per person fundraiser Thursday night in the gated backcountry enclave that is home to the Greenwich Polo Club.

Hosting the Democrat are Ellen and Richard Richman, the same couple that threw a $30,000-per-plate supper club for President Obama in 2010.

He runs The Richman Group of Companies, a Greenwich-based real estate, investment banking, construction, mortgage banking and asset and property management conglomerate. She’s an active philanthropist and adjunct professor of marketing at Pace University’s Lubin School of Business.

The couple’s 12,936-square-foot home is worth $14.4 million, according to the assessor’s office. It has six bedrooms, seven full bathrooms, 2.5 half-baths, a tennis court and a swimming pool on 19.69 acres.

A VIP reception and photo opp with Booker, who has 1.4 million followers on Twitter, will set you back $2,600 per person.

In this setting, that’s pocket change.

Co-hosting the event are Christina and Robert Baker — he’s the founder of NRDC Equity Partners, a private investment firm based in Purchase, N.Y., that owns Lord & Taylor and bought Fortunoff the Source before it filed for bankruptcy.

Abby and Guy Levy are also listed on invitation as the other co-hosts — he’s a senior vice president at Paulson & Co., a hedge fund in New York City, and her father was a founder of Hess Energy Trading Co.

Booker is the only candidate in the race currently airing television ads in New York’s prohibitively-expensive media market, buoyed by a second quarter fundraising haul of $4.6 million.

This morning, Booker quoted poet Patrick Overton on his Twitter account.

BookerTwitter.jpeg

Polls show Booker with a comfortable lead over U.S. Reps. Frank Pallone and Rush Holt, as well as has New Jersey Assembly Speaker Sheila Oliver, heading toward the Aug. 13 Democratic primary.

The Republican favorite is former Bogota, N.J., Mayor Steve Lonegan. The general election will be held on Oct. 16.

Neil Vigdor