President Donald Trump on Tuesday said he’d rather run against former New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg than Sen. Bernie Sanders in the 2020 presidential race.
“Frankly I’d rather run against Bloomberg than Bernie Sanders because Sanders has real followers,” Trump said, adding, “He has followers, Bloomberg’s just buying his way in.”
The president was asked on Tuesday about calling Bloomberg “racist” on Twitter after the former mayor’s comments resurfaced on Tuesday. Trump said he later deleted the tweet because he felt it was too nasty.
But Trump ridiculed Bloomberg for apologizing for his support for “stop and frisk” policies during a campaign event at a church in November.
“Well, I tell you what, I looked at it, and I watched him pander in a church and practically beg for forgiveness,” Trump said. “I wouldn’t have begged for forgiveness, he was doing his job at the time.”
Trump said that Bloomberg’s apology was “disingenuous” and “pathetic” after he vocally defended the policy when he was the mayor.
“That was only for getting votes and probably I think people understand that,” he said, referring to Bloomberg’s apology.
Trump said that Bloomberg would spend millions of dollars to win, but questioned his ability to win the primary.
“Look he’s a lightweight, you’re going to find that out, he’s also one of the worst debaters that I’ve ever seen,” Trump said.
When asked about Biden’s struggling campaign, Trump replied, “It’s stumbling, it’s mumbling. Not pretty.”
Trump recalled that Biden failed to get more than one percent support in the primaries before joining the Obama ticket in 2008.
“We’ll see how he does. You never know … He can always turn it around, I think it’s not going to be easy,” he said.
The president noted that the economy was roaring, unemployment was at historic lows, veterans were being taken care of, and he was protecting the Second Amendment.
“When you add it up, you know, I don’t see how we lose,” he said. “But you never know, it’s politics, right fellas?”