With former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg rising in the polls against doubts any of the long-declared Democratic candidates can defeat President Donald Trump for re-election, words he spoke in the past and comments he was rumored to have made are resurfacing.
Some of the rumored remarks are misogynistic and, according to the New York Post, show a "pattern and practice of sexual harassment, sexual degradation of women and discrimination." Another remark blames the 2008 market crash on the elimination of a discriminatory housing practice called redlining (banks refusing credit to people based on where they lived), which primarily affects minorities. Still another casts farming as a simpleton's errand - "You dig a hole, you put a seed in, you put dirt on top, add water, and up comes the corn" - and unlike the information industry where "you have to have a lot more gray matter."
Bloomberg, whether on a debate stage, from his past comments or by his Democratic competitors, is being vetted, and fast. But even last week, when he stopped in Chattanooga for a rally, a few things about the billionaire were becoming clear:
- His penchant to spin: Confronted with recently resurfaced remarks Bloomberg made in 2015 about his stop-and-frisk policy as mayor of New York City and on his statement about who commits most crimes, he said that he had apologized and that the remarks were "not the way I think," "don't reflect the way I governed" and "didn't reflect how I led the most diverse city" in the country.
If his statements were not the way he thinks, why did he make them? And even if he expediently doesn't believe them now, he apparently believed them then.
- His willingness to spend money: Most Tennessee Valley residents, if they have a television, have taken note of the astounding number of ads Bloomberg has bought on local airwaves to interest voters in his candidacy.
(MORE: Bloomberg rallies Chattanooga: 'Trump is afraid of me.')
During the rally, he also told attendees he planned to campaign in every state in pursuit of the presidency. To date, Vice President Richard Nixon in 1960 has been the only candidate to do that, effectively spending less time in the states it was crucial for him to win. In doing so, he also missed 10 days of campaigning while being hospitalized with a staph infection in his knee. When he returned, he had to pick up the pace and in doing so contracted a cold and fever. He later said that strategy was a mistake.
- His plan to be vague: Bloomberg's policy statements are reliably socially liberal - passing gun safety laws, crafting immigration reform plans, protecting a woman's right to an abortion and providing everyone with health insurance - but he doesn't talk about the cost of them or how to pass them.
- His strategy to lay off his opponents: Bloomberg's opponents are increasingly having things to say about him, but he is assiduously avoiding mentioning them. That way, none of his opponents or their supporters will be able to cite his criticism of them, making it easier for them to endorse him if the need arises or for their supporters to drift from a candidate who drops out to him.
At the news conference following his rally, he maintained he was "not current on who's up, who's down," that he was "not an expert on other candidates," was only an "expert on what I do," and that it was "not for me to tell anybody what to do." In truth, he and his campaign pay attention to the minutest details of other campaigns to achieve an advantage down the road, but at this point it's unseemly for him to say so.
- His willingness to be what he says Trump is: Trump unpresidentially refers to individuals with derisive nicknames and demeans other people with cutting, untruthful statements. Bloomberg, while referring to himself as the "unTrump," nevertheless referred to the president as the "biggest schoolyard bully," among other terms, and obfuscated in saying Trump had "inherited his wealth."
- His need to be scripted: Bloomberg spoke from teleprompters at the rally where one might have expected, in such a relatively short address and to increase enthusiasm, an off-the-cuff, fire-up-the-crowd speech. Indeed, his scripted remarks even included references to the Chattanooga-made Moon Pies and Bessie Smith, for whom the hall in which he was speaking was named. Other parts included phrases taken directly from his television ads.
- His capacity to lose his cool: When attempts were made to follow up on his answers to the stop-and-frisk question, he became testy, saying each reporter was only allowed one question, a fact which had never been mentioned to reporters and wasn't followed anyway. He also bristled at a question about "buying the election," saying he was not doing so and that blanketing the market with advertising across the country was the "best way to campaign" in this "mass media."
The next few months of the campaign will make clear how seriously the electorate takes Bloomberg's late-to-the-dance strategy.