A few days ago, White House offi­cials let it be known that Pres­i­dent Oba­ma would be stop­ping in Wash­ing­ton State again for a mid-Feb­ru­ary visit.

They did­n’t announce his itin­er­ary or sched­ule, but we fig­ured it would­n’t be long before the cam­paign began send­ing out invi­ta­tions to fundrais­ers with the Pres­i­dent. Yes­ter­day, the first invi­ta­tions began going out, for an event in down­town Belle­vue around midday.

Here are the details:

Please join Pres­i­dent Oba­ma at a Lunch with sup­port­ers like you in Bellevue.

What:
Oba­ma Vic­to­ry Fund 2012 — Lunch with Pres­i­dent Oba­ma & Spe­cial Per­for­mance by the Head and the Heart

Where:
Belle­vue Westin
600 Belle­vue Way NE
Belle­vue, Washington

When:
Fri­day, Feb­ru­ary 17, 2012
12:30 PM

Space is Limited

The min­i­mum required to get in the door is $1,000. For just $4,000 more, you can have your pic­ture tak­en with the Pres­i­dent at a pho­to recep­tion. For a grand total of $6,000, you can get into the pho­to recep­tion with a friend.

Or, for $10,000, you can buy up a table at the event.

There is a spe­cial $250 rate for Young Democ­rats, but even that reduced rate may be beyond the means of those it is intend­ed to benefit.

(Tuition in this state keeps going up, as Democ­rats cur­rent­ly attend­ing Wash­ing­ton’s pub­lic uni­ver­si­ties and col­leges can attest).

Pri­or to speak­ing at the lun­cheon, the Pres­i­dent will be attend­ing an invi­ta­tion-only brunch with even more gen­er­ous donors. His cam­paign holds a lot of those kinds of events dur­ing any giv­en month — most at pri­vate residences.

As far as we know, no events have yet been announced in Seat­tle itself.

We’ll let you know if any are.

For secu­ri­ty rea­sons, the Secret Ser­vice nev­er divulges trip logis­tics or noti­fies the news media which routes the Pres­i­den­t’s motor­cade will take dur­ing a vis­it. How­ev­er, if his­to­ry is any indi­ca­tion, it might be a good idea to avoid I‑5 and SR 520 dur­ing mid­morn­ing and midafter­noon on Fri­day, Feb­ru­ary 17th. Those high­ways will like­ly be shut down while the Pres­i­dent goes to and from Boe­ing Field.

We won­der, though: if the Pres­i­dent and his entourage take SR 520, will they need to pay the bridge toll? Emer­gency vehi­cles are exempt if on offi­cial busi­ness — but what about The Beast? And the press vans?

About the author

Andrew Villeneuve is the founder and executive director of the Northwest Progressive Institute, as well as the founder of NPI's sibling, the Northwest Progressive Foundation. He has worked to advance progressive causes for over two decades as a strategist, speaker, author, and organizer. Andrew is also a cybersecurity expert, a veteran facilitator, a delegate to the Washington State Democratic Central Committee, and a member of the Climate Reality Leadership Corps.

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8 replies on “President Obama’s schedule for February 17th Seattle visit begins to take shape”

    1. Unlike­ly. The Pres­i­dent has par­tic­i­pat­ed in just one large pub­lic event here since tak­ing office: the Octo­ber 2010 ral­ly at Hec Edmund­son Pavil­ion for Sen­a­tor Pat­ty Mur­ray. All of the oth­er events he has done here have been cam­paign fundrais­ers or offi­cial events open to preap­proved, cre­den­tialed media only.

    1. Who­ev­er told you that was incor­rect, Chris. As I wrote in the post, emer­gency vehi­cles are exempt when on offi­cial business. 

      You don’t have to take my word for it. Here’s WSDOT:

      Q. Who is exempt from pay­ing tolls on the SR 520 Bridge?
      A. Reg­is­tered van­pools and tran­sit are exempt from tolls on the SR 520 Bridge, along with emer­gency response vehi­cles such as police, fire and ambu­lances on bona-fide emer­gen­cies, Wash­ing­ton State Patrol vehi­cles assigned to the bridge, tow trucks autho­rized by the Wash­ing­ton State Patrol to clear a block­ing inci­dent, and bridge main­te­nance vehi­cles. Car­pools and motor­cy­cles are not exempt.

      I think they would know, see­ing as they’re respon­si­ble for col­lect­ing the toll.

  5. Does any­one know if the metro bus­es (Sound Tran­sit) will be oper­at­ing dur­ing the Pres­i­den­t’s appear­ance. Most­ly, some peo­ple kind of need to get to places even if the Pres­i­dent is here…

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