Alec Baldwin turned his attention away from President Trump this week to give his Hollywood peers a warning about former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg.
The liberal activist told more than 1 million Twitter followers that Mr. Bloomberg was an ideological opportunist and “a collector” who will pay nearly any price to stockpile “prestigious accomplishments.”
He cautioned Democrats in a series of tweets on Tuesday:
- “In 2008, Michael Bloomberg was poised to go into the record books as one of the better mayors in modern NY history.
Then he spent over $100m to overturn the City’s term limits, claiming that the financial crisis at the time demanded he remain in office to lend his expertise.” - “Bloomberg refused to answer the question as to whether he would withhold that expert advise if the term limit were not upended. He went on to win a third term, in part due to the role of Christine Quinn as his handmaiden in the NY City Council.”
- “Quinn delivered the change of term limits in what many believed was a deal for Bloomberg’ss endorsement of her mayoral bid. Instead, at the end of a third term many viewed as overstaying his welcome and resulting in a decline in his approval, Bloomberg cut Quinn’s throat.”
- “Her throat and did not support her campaign. Bloomberg was a Republican when it suited his purposes, became a Democrat when it suited his purposes, spent close to $300m of his own $ for three NYC mayoral races. When he wants something, he simply buys it.”
- “Bloomberg is bright, a gentleman, an enormously successful business leader. And, like others with a lot of cash on hand, a collector.
In Bloomberg’s case, it is a collection of prestigious accomplishments that will help him complete himself. All at public expense.”
Mr. Baldwin also seemed to call that same “gentleman” a racist less than 24 hours earlier by tweeting: “We don’t forgive Trump’s racism. Should the Democrats overlook it in their own candidates?”
The tweet came against a political backdrop in which Mr. Bloomberg was excoriated for past remarks about minorities.
“If you look at our jails, it’s predominantly minorities,” Mr. Bloomberg said during a 2011 interview. “If you look at where crime takes place, it’s in minority neighborhoods. If you look at who the victims and the perpetrators are, it’s virtually all minorities. This is something that has gone on for a long time.”
“There’s this enormous cohort of black and Latino males aged, let’s say 16 to 25, that don’t have jobs, don’t have any prospects, don’t know how to find jobs, don’t know what their skill sets are, don’t know how to behave in the workplace where they have to work collaboratively and collectively,” he added.
Michael Frazier, Mr. Bloomberg’s national campaign spokesman, rejected accusations of racism. Instead, he framed the candidate’s past remarks as a reaction to the nation’s cultural failures.
“There’s no debate whatsoever that for people of color, and others, America has failed to deliver on its bedrock principle of equality of opportunity in the workplace,” he said Tuesday. “Everyone knows that, but few are able to address at least part of it in a meaningful way as Mike did through his administration’s Young Men’s Initiative, which Mike is discussing and what became the national blueprint for President Obama’s My Brother’s Keeper program.”
5- Bloomberg is bright, a gentleman, an enormously successful business leader.
— HABFoundation (@ABFalecbaldwin) February 18, 2020
And, like others with a lot of cash on hand, a collector.
In Bloomberg’s case, it is a collection of prestigious accomplishments that will help him complete himself.
All at public expense.
• Douglas Ernst can be reached at dernst@washingtontimes.com.
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