Former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg would clearly be bucking history if he launches an independent campaign for president later this year, as he reportedly is contemplating.
Indeed, previous independent and third party campaigns for president dating back to Theodore Roosevelt in 1912 and H. Ross Perot in 1992 have all flamed out. Bloomberg, the 73-year-old billionaire and political moderate, would likely face the same fate should he launch an improbable national campaign at this late date.
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If Bloomberg enters the 2016 presidential race by early March – a strong possibility according to a report on Saturday by The New York Times – he would scramble an already chaotic and highly divisive campaign dominated by anti-establishment, political “outsiders” like Republicans Donald Trump and Ted Cruz, and Democratic Socialist Bernie Sanders.
Moreover, while Bloomberg likely could barely break into the double digits in national polls should he mount a campaign, his candidacy would help Trump or whoever the GOP nominee is by draining moderates and independents from the Democratic nominee, according to some experts.
“I would love to see Michael Bloomberg run,” Trump told NBC’s Meet the Press on Sunday. “I would love that competition. I think I would do very well against him.”
Meanwhile, Democrat Hillary Rodham Clinton said on the same program that her understanding is that Bloomberg would only enter the race if she loses the nomination to Sanders, setting up a Trump-Sanders showdown in the general election that might create an opening for a moderate to wage an independent race. “Well, I’m going to relieve [Bloomberg] of that and get the nomination, so he doesn’t have to run.”
A new Morning Consult national poll shows that Bloomberg would have a tough time developing the name identification necessary to put him into serious contention for president. For one thing, he lacks the political firepower of someone like Trump or Cruz. And despite his years as a dominant big city mayor and government innovator, he lacks the national experience and standing of Clinton, the former secretary of state and U.S. senator, or even Sanders for that matter.
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Just 30 percent of voters have a favorable view of Bloomberg, according to the new poll; many more (43 percent) have never heard of him or know little about him. Nonetheless, should he decide to enter the race it would be primarily to the detriment of the Democrats.