Michael Bloomberg Experts Discuss Why He’d Be an Awful Candidate
Potential third-party presidential candidate Michael Bloomberg turned 74 on Saturday, and if he wasn’t using the occasion to reflect on his mortality and legacy, others were doing so for him.
“He’s not going to run for president when he’s 78, so this is it. This is his last chance,” says Joyce Purnick, a former New York Times editor and columnist and the author of Mike Bloomberg: Money, Power, Politics. “I think he really needs to think about how he wants to go out, in terms of his last act in public life.”
For those who have spent years studying and reporting on the financier, philanthropist and three-term New York mayor, the news a few weeks ago that Bloomberg is contemplating a presidential run hardly came as a shock. “I kind of rolled my eyes,” says Julian Brash, a professor at Montclair State University and the author of Bloomberg’s New York: Class and Governance in the Luxury City. “I think he’s about ten years off the mark in terms of capturing the popular mood and taking advantage of the things that made him a strong political figure.”
If he does decide to run, both Purnick and Brash agree Bloomberg has a tough road ahead — a much tougher road than he would have had in 2008, if he’d followed through on his threat to run then.
There are a number of reasons why the particular chemistry of this election cycle is inhospitable to a candidate like Bloomberg. With the two leading Democratic candidates having spent significant time addressing issues like police brutality and mass incarceration that disproportionately affect the black community, Bloomberg’s legacy as the chief proponent of stop-and-frisk would not help him attract voters who believe Black Lives Matter. His investments in anti-gun-violence legislation through his nonprofit, Everytown for Gun Safety, and investigative website The Trace would make him unpalatable to voters who care deeply about the Second Amendment. And libertarians and Middle-American voters alike would take umbrage at the notion of President Bloomberg coming to take away their Big Gulps.