Bloomberg on the other 2020 hopefuls: ‘Trump would eat them up’

Democratic presidential contender Michael Bloomberg said in an interview that aired Friday that he believed President Trump would trounce any of the other Democratic presidential hopefuls in a head-to-head match-up, saying Trump would “eat them up.” 

{mosads}”I looked at our national government getting worse. The way we were behaving overseas and domestically, led by our president. I said back in 2016 he is the wrong person for the job. He doesn’t have the temperament, the ethics, or the intellect to do the job,” Bloomberg told Gayle King on “CBS This Morning.” “I watched and I said, ‘we just can’t have another four years of this.'” 

“Then I watched all of the candidates, and I just thought to myself, ‘Donald Trump would eat them up,'” he continued.  

In an exclusive interview with @GayleKing, former NYC Mayor @MikeBloomberg explains why he chose to enter the presidential campaign so late. Bloomberg also spoke about President Trump, other Democratic candidates and his own complicated history on the issue of race and policing. pic.twitter.com/ipQg9L07BK

— CBS This Morning (@CBSThisMorning) December 6, 2019

Bloomberg later hedged on the statement, saying that he believed he was the best candidate to take on Trump in a general election.

“Let me rephrase it. I think that I would do the best job of competing with him and beating him,” he said.  

Bloomberg announced his presidential bid last month with the strategy of ignoring the early primary states and focusing on the Super Tuesday states. 

The former New York City mayor’s entrance into the race has drawn scrutiny from his opponents, in large part due to his status as a billionaire. 

Sen. Cory Booker (D-N.J.) expressed anger this week following Sen. Kamala Harris’s (D-Calif.) exit from the race earlier in the week, noting “there’s more billionaires in the 2020 race than there are black people.” 

“Cory Booker endorsed me a number of times, and I endorsed Cory Booker a number of times,” Bloomberg said. “He’s very well-spoken. He’s got some good ideas. It would be better the more diverse any group is, but the public is out there picking and choosing, and narrowing down this field.”