Bloomberg denies he’s siphoning votes from Biden
March 3, 2020
MIAMI — Former New York Mayor Mike Bloomberg insisted on Tuesday that his ongoing presidential campaign would not end up boosting Sen. Bernie Sanders's left-wing campaign by splitting the vote of more moderate Democrats.
“I’m not helping Bernie Sanders. I’m trying to help myself,” he told POLITICO as he campaigned in Florida.
Critisim of Bloomberg has spiked in in recent days after the race's two other prominent moderates — Amy Klobuchar and Pete Buttigieg — ended their bids over the last 48 hours and endorsed Joe Biden.
Bloomberg, who entered the race late last year when Biden began to flag in the polls, said he planned to stay in the race despite signs of a resurgence from the former vice president.
“I got in because I thought that I could beat Donald Trump and I thought I could do the job of being president,” he said Tuesday. “That’s why I’m here and that’s why I started and that’s where we’re going to wind up — in the White House.”
He asserted that criticism he was siphoning votes away from Biden, the only other moderate left in the race, went both ways: “If you think I’m gonna siphon from him, he’s siphoning from me.”
Bloomberg later complained more definitively that it was Biden who was “taking votes away from me,” telling reporters in a news conference that “it goes in both directions” and bristling at questions about whether he would drop out of the race.
“Have you asked Joe whether he's going to drop out?” he asked. “When you ask him that, then you can call me.”
Source: https://www.politico.com/
