Michael Bloomberg’s punt a result of Hillary Clinton’s rise
In this Dec. 3, 2015, file photo, former New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg speaks during the C40 cities awards ceremony, in Paris. Bloomberg, the billionaire former three-term mayor of New York City, has decided against mounting a third-party White House bid in 2016. Credit: AP
In the end, these presidential deliberations by ex-Mayor Michael Bloomberg clearly hinged on the chances of his longtime friend Hillary Clinton winning the Democratic nomination.
He announced Monday he would not run for president. On Tuesday, Howard Wolfson, his senior adviser — who just happened to come to Bloomberg’s shop out of Clinton’s years ago — appeared as a guest on WNYC radio.
Host Brian Lehrer asked Wolfson if Bloomberg is endorsing Clinton.
“He has not done that,” Bloomberg’s surrogate said — thus answering a slightly different question than the one he was asked.
“There are things about her candidacy that he is not thrilled with. I won’t prejudge the outcome of his thinking on that.”
Whatever that response meant, consider what Wolfson said a few seconds earlier: Bloomberg “certainly more than likely would have run had [Bernie] Sanders been the Democratic nominee.”
“Had Sanders been . . . ”?
The primaries are still going on. New Yorkers for instance, don’t vote for another six weeks. But Wolfson — despite no current official affiliation with the Clinton operation — argued the Sanders candidacy has run its course.
“I was working for Hillary Clinton during the Democratic primary in 2007 and 2008. I know rather bitterly, firsthand, the way the delegate math is apportioned in the primary process,” Wolfson said. “There really is not a way that he can catch up.”
A Donald Trump presidency would be a “catastrophe,” he said, echoing his boss’s statement. Under the circumstances, it became difficult at times to figure out whose talking points we were now hearing.
Not that Wolfson went off-message. An outsider can only imagine how sharply ex-Democrat Trump’s success in the primaries would irritate Bloomberg. The three-term mayor has ample reason to view this other New Yorker — a boastful TV celebrity — as less classy, less thoughtful, less successful, and clearly less experienced than himself. And, unlike the self-made Bloomberg, Trump inherited his wealth, in real estate.
Bloomberg and Clinton have always been openly cordial. In fact, in critiquing the current candidate field, Bloomberg’s objection to Hillary — though not by name — seemed to be that she has failed to remain, well, Clintonian enough.
“The leading Democratic candidates have attacked policies that spurred growth and opportunity under President Bill Clinton — support for trade, charter schools, deficit reduction and the financial sector,” Bloomberg said in his statement Monday.
Positioning herself for the primaries, Clinton declared opposition to the President Barack Obama’s Trans-Pacific Partnership, went from longtime supporter to critic of charter schools, and — under fire over big contributions — didn’t defend Wall Street in debates as Bloomberg perhaps would have liked.
So it appears Bloomberg was “not thrilled” with what Clinton thought she had to do to prevail in the primaries.
But he has now made it clear he prefers her to either Trump or Texas Sen. Ted Cruz. He has condemned both men, while his spokesman proclaims Clinton the inevitable nominee.
An endorsement now might be beside the point.
Dan Janison is a member of the Newsday editorial board.
