Former New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg is weighing a late entry into the 2016 USA presidential contest as an independent candidate.
Advertisement
“It will tell people what I have been saying for a long time, is that this country is moving away from democracy to oligarchy; that billionaires are the people who are controlling our political life”, Sanders said.
United States billionaire and former New York mayor Michael Bloomberg is mulling an independent bid for the White House, The New York Times reported Saturday.
A Suffolk University/USA Today poll indicated Trump supporters would vote for him if he ran as an independent should the GOP nomination go to one of his rivals.
Sanders also spoke Sunday on Bloomberg’s possible candidacy, saying he’ll win if Bloomberg enters the race. A recent poll by Morning Consult showed Mr. Bloomberg receiving 13% support from voters, Democrat Hillary Clinton getting 36% and Republican Donald Trump 37%. His advisers and associates said he was galled by Donald Trump’s dominance of the Republican field, and troubled by Hillary Clinton’s stumbles and the rise of Sen.
Bloomberg, 73, who served as mayor of NY from 2002-2013, has said repeatedly that he would not run for president, but his aide insisted that “He’s definitely thinking about [running for president] more than he was”, according to ABC News.
The nominee needs a majority of votes from the electoral college in order to secure the nomination, otherwise the election is decided by the House of Representatives, which is overwhelmingly controlled by Republicans. In such a case, Bloomberg apparently believes he would draw support from moderates in both parties.
“I like Michael”, Kasich said.
But, you know, he was a good mayor of NY, and if he wants to run, it will probably stimulate the debate.
“There are so many parallels to 2008”, said one longtime Clinton ally and adviser, referring to the race in which she had begun as the frontrunner but lost to first-term IL senator Barack Obama.
The founder of the financial news and information provider Bloomberg LP, he was a political novice when he launched an unlikely bid for mayor in 2001.
He won a narrow victory and was re-elected handily four years later.
Advertisement
But his cozy relationship with Wall Street and anti-public-sector union efforts in New York City could similarly alienate liberals who might agree with him on social policy.
