Starting at 0:30 mark
Transcript:
Tucker Carlson: Former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg appears to be running for president. Now, in the plus column, Bloomberg is one of the richest people in America. More than ten billion dollars. More money than he could ever spend. He’s also highly popular on the set of the MSNBC morning show and he’s absolutely beloved on Martha’s Vineyard during the summer months. Yet that’s the upside to the candidacy. On the other hand, Mayor Bloomberg is not exactly the kind of candidate that Democrat primary voters picture when they dream about their ideal candidate. Maybe that’s why prominent Democrats reacted to the news today this way.
Rep. Ro Khanna (D-CA): Well John, do you really think the country wants another New York billionaire after Donald Trump? Usually we elect the opposite.
Kirsten Powers: We very often underestimate the level of affection there is among Democratic voters for Joe Biden. Mike Bloomberg, whatever his, you know, whatever good things you can say about him, he just doesn’t have.
Aisha Moodie-Mills: It feels a little bit like a hail mary for a certain, uh, class of folks. I think it would be more genuine if he would actually run as a Republican given his record.
Jess McIntosh: I don’t see any room here. He’s a relatively ideologically neutral billionaire and there are zero people clamoring for that right now.
Bianna Golodryga: And David, Mike Bloomberg is also another white septuagenarian who is entering the race as well, many asking if that’s something that we need at this point.
Lots of Dems are not happy with Bloomberg’s late entry.
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Democrats debate presidential field on news of Michael Bloomberg’s potential candidacy
By Matt Viser, Michelle Ye Hee Lee, Annie Linskey and Michael Scherer | November 8, 2019
(Washington Post) – Even for a party accustomed to an anxious donor and political class — a group of second-guessers that Obama adviser David Plouffe famously called the “bed wetters” — billionaire Michael Bloomberg’s likely entry into the Democratic presidential primary has supercharged a debate over whether the party has the right candidates, whether the time for entries has passed, and whether yet other candidates could raise the mountain of cash needed for a credible campaign.
Bloomberg’s decision, fueled by his dissatisfaction with the race’s leading moderate, former vice president Joe Biden, and worries about the rise of liberal leader Elizabeth Warren, injected renewed volatility into the primary race just three months before voting begins with the Iowa caucuses.
Biden’s donors are growing more concerned about his standing — even as some of them begin to write six-figure checks in the hope that a newly formed super PAC can prop up a flagging candidacy that is now further threatened by Bloomberg’s potential entrance. Warren and her allies, meanwhile, welcomed a billionaire foil whom they hope to use to drive home her populist message. Nonetheless, polling this week showing her losing to Trump in critical upper Midwestern states sent a thunderbolt of fear through even some of her boosters.
“It’s a mix in all these cases of three things: nervousness about Warren as a general election candidate, nervousness about Biden as a primary candidate and fundamental nervousness about Trump and somehow the party will blow the race,” said the Democratic consultant David Axelrod. “That’s really a lot of what’s motivating donors and activists.”
Bloomberg’s sudden interest was driven by looming deadlines to file paperwork to get on statewide ballots. The calendar also will force the hand of any other potential entrants, a group that must have either wealth or an existing political network to replicate candidacies that in some cases have been hustling for support for nearly a year.
Names being floated as potential candidates include former Massachusetts governor Deval Patrick and former U.S. attorney general Eric H. Holder Jr. Former secretary of state John F. Kerry, the party’s 2004 nominee, also has been mentioned, although people close to him insist that he will not enter the race.
The party’s 2016 nominee, Hillary Clinton, was fielding calls in recent days about whether to get into the race, some close to her said. While it is still unlikely that she will run, some allies have gone so far as to talk about a potential pathway that would bypass Iowa and New Hampshire and focus on making a stand in South Carolina.
Bloomberg on Friday announced a similar potential plan, with an adviser saying that if Bloomberg did run, he would not aggressively compete in the first four states, an unorthodox strategy that, for those who have tried it, has led to electoral defeat. The announcement suggested that Bloomberg planned to uncork his campaign for the March 3 Super Tuesday primaries, at which point the race covers multiple states at a staggering cost to candidates.
“The late timing of our entry means that many candidates already have a big head start in the four early states, where they’ve spent months and months campaigning and spending money,” said the Bloomberg adviser, Howard Wolfson. “We have enormous respect for the Democratic primary process and many friends in those states, but our plan is to run a broad-based, national campaign.”
The decision quickly drew scorn from early-state officials, with New Hampshire Democratic Party chairman Ray Buckley saying they were “disappointed and frankly very surprised” by Bloomberg’s move.
“It’s unfortunate that Michael Bloomberg doesn’t want to participate in this invaluable, important and unique primary process and be tested the same way that the other Democratic candidates have been and will be,” Buckley said in a statement…
h/t Fist McKraken