Gov. Steve Bullock of Montana warned Democrats Friday to be wary of former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s deep pockets after reports emerged that he plans to dump $30 million on “a single week of political TV ads.”
“The Democratic primary isn’t for sale — and a billionaire spending hundreds of millions of dollars to buy an election isn’t going to fix our political system,” Mr. Bullock said.
Mr. Bullock’s failure to keep pace with the top fundraisers already in the 2020 presidential field has kept him off most of the debate stages and the prospect of Mr. Bloomberg joining the race isn’t sitting well with him.
“We’ve already seen a billionaire buy his way onto the debate stage,” he said, alluding to Tom Steyer, who also has invested millions in ads that have helped him qualify for debates. “Now, an even bigger billionaire wants to buy his way to the nomination by completely ignoring voters in the first primaries and caucuses.”
Mr. Bullock has vowed to root out the corrupting influence of money in politics and clearly has become frustrated with the rules of the Democratic primary process.
“The fight against the toxic influence of money in politics has been the fight of my career, and as president, I’ll ensure our elections are decided on the strength of candidates’ ideas, not the size of their bank accounts,” he said.
• Seth McLaughlin can be reached at smclaughlin@washingtontimes.com.
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