President Obama raises nearly $1.5 million in 3 hours

President Obama attended a whirlwind pair of exclusive fundraisers with top Democratic donors Thursday night, further padding his reelection campaign coffers as his defense of the White House pivots into general-election mode.

At the first of the two fundraisers, 20 donors paid $40,000 apiece for an intimate closed-press meeting with the president. Shortly thereafter, Obama crossed town for a larger fundraiser where some 250 people chipped in $2,500 apiece. In total, the president raised around $1.425 million for a joint fundraising committee fun by his campaign and the Democratic National Committee.

The president raised some $45 million in February, $29.1 million in January and $68 million in the fourth quarter of 2011. The amounts have enabled the president to rapidly deploy his reelection team; according to Federal Election Commission reports, Obama has already spent more than $135 million on his campaign, $3 million more than the entire Republican field combined.

At the event, the president again targeted the House GOP budget proposal and mocked likely opponent Mitt Romney by name.

"I gave a speech on Tuesday about the congressional budget that’s been proposed by the Republicans in the House of Representatives — a budget that Governor Romney, who is the front-runner in the Republican side, has embraced. Said the budget was 'marvelous,' he said," Obama said to laughter. "And when you go through this budget, the vision that it portrays is of an America where everybody is fending for themselves, a few are doing very well at the top, and everybody else is struggling to get by."

The president went on to say the proposal, by House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan (R-Wis.), would undermine some of the core priorities — education, science research, early childhood education, caring for the environment, looking after veterans, keeping up with U.S> infrastructure, food safety — of the government.

"We are going to have a big and important debate in this country, and I cannot wait,” Obama said. “We have tried what they are selling. We tried what they are peddling and it did not work. We have spent the last three years cleaning up after some of that mess and I don’t want to do it again.”

Romney pushed back on the president's needling of his support for the Ryan budget as "marvelous" earlier Thursday.

Romney told Fox News Radio that there were "plenty of adjectives" he'd use to celebrate Republicans winning the White House in the fall.

"This has not been a good presidency and I think that's one of the reasons people want a change. And frankly, I can think of a lot of wonderful adjectives to describe how happy we will all be when we send Barack Obama home," Romney said.

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