As Bloomberg weighs White House run, Iowa voters ask, ‘Who?’

Former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg – a onetime moderate Republican – is considering throwing $1 billion of his vast fortune into an independent, stop-Donald Trump bid for president, The New York Times reported Saturday.

“Mike Bloomberg for president rests on the not-impossible but somewhat unlikely circumstance of either Donald Trump or Ted Cruz versus Bernie Sanders“, the New York Times quotes Edward G. Rendell, former governor of Pennsylvania and ally of Hilary Clinton.

Former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg is again weighing a possible independent bid for the White House after seeing an opening in a chaotic and unpredictable 2016 race.

What happens after that is anyone’s guess but when asked if he thinks Sanders can keep up the momentum of his prospective Iowa and New Hampshire wins to get the nomination, Weiner simply said “No”.

Bloomberg has given himself a deadline of March to make his final decision, which is also the latest date he can file papers to appear on the ballot in all 50 states.

Michael Bloomberg has lamented what he considers Mrs. Clinton’s lurch to the left in her contest against Mr. Sanders, especially her criticism of charter schools and other education reforms that he pushed as mayor and has continued to support since leaving office. “I would personally like to compete with Michael Bloomberg“, Trump told CBS’ “Face the Nation” in a phone interview Sunday morning.

The former NY mayor has been upset by what he sees as extremist rhetoric from Republicans in the race and a perceived leftward move by Democratic front runner Hillary Clinton.

There hasn’t been any significant polling to support whether Sanders could beat both Bloomberg and Trump, though critics have noted that Bloomberg’s potential run as a pragmatic technocrat would likely favor the Republican candidate. Marco Rubio said that “If he becomes a candidate, then we’ll have a conversation about our differences”.

He can afford it – Bloomberg is the 14th-richest man in America and estimated to be worth some $36 billion, according to Forbes’ 2015 list of billionaires.

The weekend disclosure from a source close to the situation that Bloomberg is laying the groundwork for a run that he could launch should Democratic front-runner Hillary Clinton falter, sent shock waves rippling through the entire presidential field. “And as you know from prior experience, caucus-goers in Iowa, many make up their mind on the day of the caucus or the days leading up to it. So we feel we are gaining momentum at just the right time“. No independent candidate in history has been elected to the White House.

Mr Trump’s campaign was hit by another controversy as the candidate declared at a rally: “I could stand in the middle of 5th Avenue and shoot somebody and I wouldn’t lose voters”. “There are a lot of guys like that”, Rubio said on “Fox News Sunday“.