PRE-CACUSES
What happens in Vegas, does (not) stay in Vegas!
On 19th of February, right before the Nevada Caucuses, a debate was held in Las Vegas, Nevada, which featured six Democratic candidates who got the qualification to participate in that debate.
The qualified candidates included: former Vice President Joe Biden, former New York City Mayor Mike Bloomberg, former South Bend, Indiana Mayor Pete Buttigieg, Minnesota Senator Amy Klobuchar, Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders and Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren. It was the first time that mayor Bloomberg qualified for a debate.
It was the ninth and the most contentious debate yet. Michael Bloomberg, whose net worth is 63 Billion dollars, so far has spent more than $400 million on his campaign and ads. We have seen his polling numbers rise steadily among voters since entering the race, which is why his rivals unanimously decided to go after him aggressively on the debate stage.
His past actions and policies such as “stop and frisk” were brought up and his record as mayor was attacked. Bloomberg probably realized he has a harder path to the White House that he had anticipated. Especially given the fact that it was his first time on the debate stage while other candidates had already engaged in eight debates since last year.
Photo credit: Erin Schaff/The New York Times
BLOOMBERG – TRUMP
Bloomberg’s rivals tried to paint him as another version of Trump, and draw parallels between them. What they failed to mention was that the way these two got their wealth are two completely different stories.
Coming from different backgrounds, Donald Trump inherited more than $400 million from his father, Fred Trump’s business empire. Also as a young adult, he borrowed one million dollars from his dad, as he once put it “a small amount of one million dollars”. He lost lots of money in his investments, and his hotel and casino businesses has declared bankruptcy 6 times between 1991 and 2009.
Bloomberg on the other hand, was born into a middle class family in suburbs Boston, Massachusetts. His father was a bookkeeper for a dairy company and his income never surpassed $6000 a year in his lifetime. Mike graduated from Harvard University. After getting laid off from his job as an investment banker at “Salomon Brothers bank” at age 39, he started a company from scratch that today employs 20,000 people. He served three times as Mayor of New York City and created nearly half a million jobs, expanded health insurance to 700,000 people, and his environmental policies reduced city’s carbon footprint.
He gives most of his company’s profits to support causes such as climate change, gun safety, and health care. In 2019 alone, he donated $3.3 billions to charitable causes. Some critics say he is typical example of how elites wield philanthropy to maintain a status quo that keeps them on top. Nevertheless, in an era where the very existence of climate change is questioned by some, like President Trump who infamously claimed that “Climate Change is a hoax created by China”, Bloomberg has prioritized the environment for years.
NEVADA POLLS
Prior to the Democratic Caucuses, average Nevada polls showed Bernie Sanders ahead of other candidates.
Bernie Sanders: 30%
Joe Biden: 16%
Elizabeth Warren: 15%
Pete Buttigieg: 13%
Amy Klobuchar: 10%
2020 NEVADA CAUCUS RESULTS
A slow count delayed the release of official results. The final report showed Bernie Sanders to be the winner of the caucuses.
Bernie Sanders: 46% / 14 delegates
Joe Biden: 20% / 4 delegates
Pete Buttigieg: 14% / 2 delegates
Elizabeth Warren: 9% / 0 delegates
Rest of the candidates were each at less than 5% and got zero delegates.
Michael Bloomberg did not appear on the ballot for the Nevada caucuses. He has intentionally chosen to skip every state that votes in February: Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada, and South Carolina.
REPUBLICANS CANCELED EVENTS ALTOGETHER
Meanwhile, the Republican Party canceled Nevada Caucuses altogether, a move critics call undemocratic and even un-American. Many believe this shows complete and unquestionable loyalty of RNC and Republicans to President Trump.
However, Nevada is not the only state for which the GOP presidential primaries and caucuses are canceled in favor of the President. As of now, South Carolina, Arizona, Alaska, Hawaii, Virginia and Kansas are the other states that have scrapped the events, formally declared Trump the winner by default, and pledged to allocate all their delegates to the president and thus, crushed the dream of Trump challengers. Most prominent one of which is Bill Weld of Massachusetts, the former governor of that State from 1991 to 1997. A Harvard and Oxford graduate, who also worked as United States Assistant General for the Crime Division under President Ronald Reagan.
Therefore, Nevada GOP awarded all 25 delegates to Trump.
On February 7th, Joe Walsh, the other GOP candidate dropped out of the race and accused Republican Party of turning into a “cult” in which Trump cannot be beat.
Maryam Rahmani