Former chief White House strategist Steve Bannon touched on several topics during a recent Fox Business interview, including the 2020 race, which he says is Donald Trump’s to lose and that Michael Bloomberg’s candidacy will open the door for Hillary Clinton to “save” the Democratic Party.
Bannon said the Democrats’ voting base will soon throw former Vice President Joe Biden away (though, you keep hearing this a lot as he continues to lead in pretty much every major poll), opening the door for Bloomberg and … the return of Clinton.
“They’ll throw Biden away to get to Trump and hope Elizabeth Warren or I even think Hillary Clinton or Bloomberg or some centrist comes in here,” he said. “All these other people that could have been the centrist candidate for whatever reason haven’t materialized. And that leaves a huge opportunity for two people, I believe: Michael Bloomberg and Hillary Clinton.
“It’s quite evident that, look, the ratings — and President Trump follows this; like the ratings for the impeachment started to drop off. The ratings for the Democratic primaries are dropping off. There’s a lack of interest. There’s no star power. And more importantly, there doesn’t seem like a fighter that can take on Trump.”
Bannon then discussed what Bloomberg brings to the table, particularly “capital.” Bloomberg, of course, is worth north of $50 billion, far more than even Trump, so he has more than enough money to throw around. Bloomberg has said he’ll spend up to $100 million on his campaign, and has already doled out $20 million on an anti-Trump voting registration drive in five swing states.
“He’s very smart in applying his capital to politics. Remember, one of the reasons we have this impeachment going on is because Nancy Pelosi took the House on the shoulders of Mike Michael Bloomberg — Bloomberg’s money,” Bannon said. “It was $100 million of Bloomberg’s capital that went in. I think they focused on 25 House races and won 23 of them. So to a large extent, Nancy Pelosi owes her job to Michael Bloomberg. He’s been he’s been moving these chess pieces around for a while. He hopes to use his capital to blow a hole because he sees Mayor Pete (Buttigieg), Biden, Cory Booker, the other centrists are just not getting traction.
“And I believe he thinks the Wall Street faction of the Democratic Party is not going to have a coronation for Elizabeth Warren. So he’s going to come in, I think is going to totally disrupt the race. And I believe Hillary Clinton is going to look and say, ‘I’m going to step in to save the Democratic Party.’ And so don’t count — I’m only 2-for-2 on this. I think Hillary Clinton is taking a hard look and seeing what Bloomberg is doing and seeing how Bloomberg is trying to position himself. I think the Democratic race is wide open.”
Ultimately, Bannon said, no one can beat Trump — other than Trump himself — in the 2020 election.
“The only person who can beat Donald Trump is Donald Trump. Nobody — Michael is not going to beat — there’s nobody out there that can beat him. I think, look, if you see where the economy’s going, if you see how he’s sorting out the national security situation. If you see how people are now focused on prosperity and they get around the Thanksgiving table at the end of the year, University of Michigan’s consumer report came out. I think it’s the 30th month in the row. It’s been over ninety five. And we haven’t had optimism like this from the consumer since the 1990s and the Internet and when the Internet stocks were on fire.”
