Michael Bloomberg to spend $500M on anti-Trump campaign: Report
Billionaire businessman Michael Bloomberg – who is reportedly mulling a presidential bid – is prepared to spend millions to deny President Trump another term, whether he puts his hat in the ring or not.
Bloomberg is prepared to spend $500 million of his own money to make sure Trump isn’t elected to a second term, according to a recent report from Politico, which cited Democratic operatives briefed on his plans.
If he decides to run in 2020, he will put that cash toward his own campaign – with the expectation that future spending could easily exceed that amount, Politico reported.
If not, he will allocate the funds– and the data his team collects – toward a “data-heavy campaign designed to operate as a shadow political party” to help the Democratic nominee win.
As previously reported by FOX Business, Bloomberg has indicated to employees and executives at his media company that he wants to run.
During an interview with Iowa Radio in December, Bloomberg said if he runs for president, he would either sell the Bloomberg media company or place it in a blind trust. A blind trust is a financial arrangement by which a person cedes control, but not ownership, of business management to an independent trust to avoid conflicts of interest.
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“But I think at my age, if selling it is possible, I would do that,” he said. “At some point, you’re going to die anyway, so you want to do it before then.”
The Bloomberg media company has an estimated valuation of $50 billion and generated $9.6 billion in revenue in fiscal 2017, according to Forbes. As its founder, he owns 88 percent of the company and has a personal net worth estimated around $47 billion.