Hill.TV host Krystal Ball warned Friday that voters should be wary of electing billionaires amid Tom Steyer’s recent rise in Nevada and South Carolina.
“We have had it ceaselessly drilled into us that these people are superior. These people who have stepped on everyone and destroyed everything they needed to claw their way to the top of the inequality leader or even the ones who just landed there through no effort of their own, thanks to mommy and daddy,” Ball said.
“We are conditioned to look at them as leaders, as worthy of our respect, but please don’t be moved by the barrage of ads and seduction of class hierarchy,” she added. “We can do better than billionaires.”
Steyer appears to have qualified for Tuesday’s Democratic presidential debate in Iowa after surging in two Fox News polls.
The billionaire jumped to second place with 15 percent support in South Carolina, according to a Fox News poll released Thursday. Biden maintained his long-time lead in the state at 36 percent followed by Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) at 14 percent and Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) at 10 percent.
A separate Fox News poll of Nevada, meanwhile, found the billionaire in a tie with Warren for third place at 12 percent support. The former vice president led with 23 percent, followed by Sanders at 17 percent.
Steyer’s late debate qualification marked a turn of events for the billionaire, who had invested millions of dollars of his own money into his campaign with little return in success until now.
According to the latest data from Advertising Analytics, Steyer has spent $67 million on the airways so far. This amount spent is more than the rest of the Democratic field has shelled out on advertising combined, with the exception of former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, who has spent more than $140 million of his own money on campaign ads.
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