26 United States The EconomistFebruary 15th 2020
O
n a rainyafternoon in Chattanooga, the queue for Mike
Bloomberg trailed around the block. Eleven weeks into his
presidential campaign, the former New York mayor and world’s
12th-richest man is already well known in Tennessee. This was his
fourth visit to the state, one of 14 that will hold its primary vote on
March 3rd. He is also dominating its airwaves, with television ads
touting his criticisms of Donald Trump, mayoral record and phil-
anthropic support for gun control and climate-change policy run-
ning on a loop. “It’s almost like it was with Obama,” said a sodden
Chattanoogan retiree, marvelling at the size of the crowd.
The back-to-front oddity of Mr Bloomberg’s campaign has
drawn a lot of scorn. Presidential primaries have traditionally
been decided by the first four early-voting states which, because of
his late entry to the race, he is sitting out. His politics, as a former
Republican, once synonymous with racially insensitive policing,
also looked hopeless to many leftist commentators. Yet self-made
billionaires tend not to be bad at reckoning their odds. And, sure
enough, while Mr Bloomberg’s rivals knocked lumps out of each in
Iowa and New Hampshire, his aggressive campaigning in the Su-
per Tuesday states has produced the biggest, fastest polling surge
of the contest.
He sits third in The Economist’s national polling aggregate, on
16%. And with Joe Biden falling, he may soon be second to Senator
Bernie Sanders, the winner in New Hampshire. This has already at-
tracted an impressive ripple of endorsements, including from
three members of the Congressional Black Caucus—hitherto Mr
Biden’s biggest champion—this week. And if the primary were in-
deed to start looking like a face-off between Mr Bloomberg and the
widely mistrusted Mr Sanders, many more would follow. Diminu-
tive, prickly and poor at public speaking, Mr Bloomberg is almost
nothing like Barack Obama—save potentially in one regard. Unlike
their more uniform opponents, Democrats’ first concern is to find
a leader capable of uniting their party’s ethno-politically divided
coalition. Mr Obama did so magnificently—which is why Mr Bi-
den, his bumbling deputy, has been afforded such an extended
stab at assuming the role. The nascent enthusiasm for Mr Bloom-
berg, before he has contested a primary or debated any of his
Democratic rivals, suggests he might soon be auditioned for it.Therearetworeasons for his rise. First, the vastness of his
spending. He is estimated to have splurged over $300m on tv, ra-
dio and digital advertising alone. To put that in perspective, Amy
Klobuchar, a rival moderate, recently had $5m in hand. Mr Bloom-
berg has also assembled a huge and talented campaign team—with
so far 2,100 employees, many of whom earn twice what other cam-
paigns pay. The resources and professionalism of his rallies are on
a different level from his rivals’. When it became clear that the ven-
ue in Chattanooga could not accommodate at least 200 of those
queuing, his technicians rigged up a sound system outside the
building within minutes. At a later event in Nashville, over 1,000
attendees were served a barbeque supper and all the “I like Mike”
badges and t-shirts they could carry.
The second thing in Mr Bloomberg’s favour is that the verdict of
the earliest states is far from decisive. The centre-left is currently
split between Pete Buttigieg, Ms Klobuchar and the fading Mr Bi-
den. This has made Mr Sanders, through his dominance of the
smaller left-wing faction, a weak front-runner. To challenge him,
either Mr Biden would have to rally his erstwhile non-white sup-
porters, or else Mr Buttigieg or Ms Klobuchar would have to win
them. Yet Mr Biden looks blown. And, notwithstanding their attri-
butes, Mr Buttigieg and Ms Klobuchar are still giving many voters
pause. Neither a gay mayor nor a woman has yet made it to the
White House. The fact that Mr Bloomberg is himself a “short, di-
vorced Jewish billionaire from New York”, as he once self-depre-
catingly termed himself, does not now seem disqualifying.
In reality, no candidate looks able to unite Democrats as Mr
Obama did: Mr Bloomberg would certainly alienate many Sander-
nistas. Yet the best argument for his candidacy may be that he is
unusually able to focus wandering Democratic minds on the com-
mon enemy: Mr Trump. The many symmetries between the two
New Yorkers are glaring and unfailingly to Mr Bloomberg’s credit.
He is a self-made billionaire; Mr Trump inherited his wealth and
bankrupted his companies. Mr Bloomberg has a record of improv-
ing government by bringing business-like efficiencies to it; the
president is a wrecker. Mr Bloomberg is one of America’s most gen-
erous philanthropists; Mr Trump used his family foundation to
buy a portrait of himself to hang in one of his golf clubs. And if
Democrats doubt that such comparisons are important, they
should reflect that, if Mr Bloomberg were his opponent, Mr Trump
would think about little else. A recent quip by Mr Bloomberg about
Mr Trump’s lesser wealth (asked about the prospect of two billion-
aires vying for the presidency, he asked: “Who’s the other one?”)
was plainly intended for an audience of one.Bloomberg terminal
There are still huge questions about his candidacy. His support has
been inflated by high name-recognition in places where his oppo-
nents are absent. If he performs badly in his first clashes with
them—starting with a televised debate in Las Vegas on February
19th—it could shrivel. Having been largely ignored by his rivals
thus far, he is also due some potentially damaging attention. The
unearthing this week of some past thuggish remarks by Mr Bloom-
berg in support of his controversial policing was an early taste.
A bigger fear is that, instead of capitalising on the Democrats’
divided field, he may fracture it further. He could nab enough of Mr
Biden’s support with non-whites to stop Mr Buttigieg or Ms Klobu-
char uniting the centre-left, yet be unable to do so himself. Perhaps
his qualities are worth the risk. But if it backfires, he will have done
more than almost anyone to make Mr Sanders the nominee. 7Lexington Mike Bloomberg’s moment
The former mayor of New York’s lavish spending and weak rivals make him a contender