Former New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg said when he was deciding whether or not to jump into the race for the White House that he took a look at the Democratic candidates running and didn’t see anyone who could seriously challenge President Trump.
“I looked at our national government getting worse, the way we’re behaving overseas and domestically led by our president,” the billionaire said in an interview that aired Friday on “CBS This Morning.”
“I watched, and I said we just can’t have another four years of this,” he said. “And then I watched all the candidates, and I just thought to myself, ’Donald Trump would eat [them] up.’ “
He then rephrased: “I think that I would do the best job of competing with him and beating him.”
Mr. Bloomberg jumped into the race for the Democratic presidential nomination last month. He’s already on the rise in some public polling and is blanketing the airwaves with millions of dollars’ worth of ads.
“Lots of people can enter,” he said when asked about the idea of another “old white gentleman” entering the race.
“If you wanted to enter and run for president of the United States, you could have done that. But don’t complain to me that you’re not in the race. It was up to you,” Mr. Bloomberg said. “And I thought there was a lot of diversity in the group of Democratic aspirants. Entry is not a barrier.”
• David Sherfinski can be reached at dsherfinski@washingtontimes.com.
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