Bloomberg puts $80M toward flipping House
Political independent largely aiding Dems
Michael Bloomberg, the billionaire former mayor of New York City, has decided to throw his political clout and personal fortune behind the Democratic campaign to take control of the House of Representatives this year, directing aides to spend tens of millions of dollars in an effort to expel Republicans from power.
Bloomberg — a political independent who has championed left-of-center policies on gun control, immigration and the environment — has approved a plan to pour at least $80 million into the 2018 election, with the bulk of that money going to support Democratic congressional candidates, advisers to Bloomberg said.
By siding so emphatically with one party, Bloomberg has the potential to upend the financial dynamics of the midterm campaign, which have appeared to favor Republicans up to this point. Facing intense opposition to President Donald Trump and conservative policies, Republicans have been counting on a strong economy and heavily funded outside groups to give them a political advantage in key races, especially in affluent suburbs.
Bloomberg’s intervention is likely to undermine that financial advantage by bankrolling advertising on television, online and in the mail for Democratic candidates in a dozen or more congressional districts, chiefly in moderate suburban areas where Trump is unpopular. Democrats need to gain 23 congressional seats to win a majority.
While Bloomberg has not chosen his list of targeted races yet, he is unlikely to get involved in rural, conservativeleaning districts where his views on guns and other issues could stir an uproar, according to people briefed on his plans, some of whom spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss private deliberations.
The new alliance between Bloomberg, 76, and congressional Democrats marks a fresh stage in the former mayor’s political evolution. And it promises to put New York and its political leaders even more squarely at the center of a midterm campaign already stocked with prominent characters from the city, including a president who made his fortune in Manhattan real estate; the top Democrat in the Senate, Chuck Schumer; and Bloomberg’s predecessor in Gracie Mansion, Rudy Giuliani, who serves as a lawyer for Trump.
After moving freely between elite circles in both parties for years, Bloomberg is now poised to become one of the Democrats’ most important benefactors: His spending on House campaigns appears likely to exceed the involvement of donors like Sheldon Adelson, the Republican casino billionaire who recently donated $30 million to a super PAC aligned with House Speaker Paul Ryan, and Tom Steyer, the liberal hedge-fund investor spending tens of millions of dollars on voter-turnout programs and television ads demanding Trump’s impeachment.
Bloomberg outlined his plans in a statement, denouncing the Republican Congress and urging a return to divided control of the federal government. His 2018 effort is to be overseen by Howard Wolfson, a close adviser who is a former executive director of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee; Wolfson confirmed the scale of the spending envisioned.
Calling Republican leaders in the House “absolutely feckless,” Bloomberg criticized them for failing to check Trump or to exercise rigorous oversight of his presidential administration.
“I’ve never thought that the public is well-served when one party is entirely out of power, and I think the past year and half has been evidence of that,” Bloomberg said, lamenting that Republicans “have done little to reach across the aisle to craft bipartisan solutions — not only on guns and climate change, but also on jobs, immigration, health care and infrastructure.”
Bloomberg continued: “Republicans in Congress have had almost two years to prove they could govern responsibly. They failed.”
Bloomberg’s partisan loyalties have shifted repeatedly over the years: He was a registered Democrat before switching parties to be elected mayor in 2001, and hosted the Republican convention in New York in 2004 before leaving that party to become an independent three years later. He twice made serious preparations to run for president as an independent, in 2008 and 2016, but both times ultimately decided against it.