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Post by Admin on Feb 20, 2020 6:33:58 GMT
The Democratic debate in Las Vegas on Wednesday night came at an important, even pivotal, time in the primary. Bernie Sanders’s strong results in Iowa and New Hampshire, Joe Biden’s national decline, and Bloomberg’s ad-fueled rise have shaken up the race — and everyone’s looking to take advantage. The result was two of the most heated hours of the primary, starting with the opening criticisms of billionaire Mike Bloomberg. The feisty tone never really let up, leading to a series of aggressive attacks from one candidate to another rarely seen in the eight previous debates. And at this important time, some candidates did well, while others … well, they had a rougher night. Here’s our sense of who came out ahead and who lagged behind. Winner: Elizabeth Warren The Massachusetts senator had performed poorly in the first two primary contests, declined in the national polls, and faded into the background in the past few debates. It looked like her campaign was on death’s door. The 7 most dramatic, eye-popping moments from the Democratic debate in Las Vegas It seems like Warren needs a miracle to save her campaign, and while strong debate performances haven’t always translated into good polling in the past, Wednesday night was still one hell of a start. Warren dominated the stage, delivering striking answers in one of the best performances I’ve seen from a presidential candidate — not just in this cycle, but ever. Later in the debate, Warren grilled Bloomberg on his refusal to release women who have worked for him from nondisclosure agreements, showing off her questioning skills honed on the Senate floor. She got Bloomberg to say that “none of [the women] accuse me of doing anything other than maybe they didn’t like a joke I told” — which is practically admitting that he created a hostile workplace for women on national television. Those weren’t Warren’s only standout moments. She had characteristically strong policy answers, strong hits on other candidates, and even a reasonably compelling defense of the other woman onstage (Amy Klobuchar) in a way that bolstered her feminist positioning. She owned the night — a vital first step toward making her campaign top-tier again.
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Post by Admin on Feb 20, 2020 18:05:15 GMT
Loser: Mike Bloomberg Up until Wednesday, Bloomberg’s campaign had been a grand experiment. It eschewed the typical marks of a political campaign — public events, speeches, actual interactions with voters — in favor of an unprecedented ad blitz funded by the former mayor’s seemingly unlimited personal fortune. Bloomberg has spent more than $400 million of his own money on political ads. As my Vox colleague Ezra Klein noted, “if you ignore Tom Steyer, the other self-funding billionaire chasing the Democratic nomination, Bloomberg has spent more than three times as much as all the other Democratic candidates combined.” The big question underlying Bloomberg’s campaign has been whether it’s possible to win the Democratic nomination — and potentially the presidency — by muscling out the competition with massive amounts of money. He arrived at the debate with a target on his chest and spent the evening taking incoming attacks. When he got a chance to respond to Warren’s opening, he had no real answer, instead launching into a generic speech about how he can beat Trump because, among other things, Bloomberg is a “New Yorker.” Mike Bloomberg is a disaster The harsh take on Bloomberg’s performance is that a billionaire seeking to paper over his record with truckloads of money is simply not the candidate Democrats are looking for in 2020. The more charitable take is that campaigning is a learned skill, and it’s hard to compete with five grizzled veterans if you’ve spent the bulk of the 2020 primary season buying ads. Whichever take you believe, Bloomberg had a terrible night.
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Post by Admin on Feb 21, 2020 5:45:35 GMT
Michael Bloomberg has spent an astonishing $464 million on his presidential campaign -- which he launched just 10 weeks ago, as he noted on the debate stage Wednesday night.
That debate was the major debut of Bloomberg's presidential campaign -- and he came off a bit rusty. His debate performance has been widely panned. Bloomberg has spent the most money of anyone on that stage, and he spoke the least, coming in at 13 minutes and 6 seconds, just behind Joe Biden.
Let's do a little math (Andrew Yang-style) on how much Bloomberg's campaign spent to appear onstage: $464 million (thanks to Bloomberg campaign's filing released Thursday) ÷ 13 minutes and 6 seconds (or 786 seconds) of speaking time = $590,330.78 per second. That works out to $35,419,847 per minute!
The wild thing about Bloomberg is that his success basically has nothing to do with his debate performance (unlike fellow billionaire candidate Tom Steyer, who advertised, in part, to get ON stage). Bloomberg has so much money that he can use his own preferred platforms to get his message out the way he wants to, through paid media, rather than the traditional earned media methods, like sit-down interviews and town halls, where he'd face tougher scrutiny.
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Post by Admin on Feb 22, 2020 20:18:56 GMT
Watch The Full NBC News/MSNBC Democratic Debate In Las Vegas | NBC News The ninth Democratic debate of this election cycle, which saw candidates tear into former New York City Mayor Mike Bloomberg in his first appearance, was the most-watched ever, drawing just under 20 million total viewers. Wednesday night’s feisty affair, which aired across MSNBC and NBC News, comfortably beat the previous record of 18 million viewers who tuned in for the NBC, MSNBC and Telemundo debate from June 2019. None of the Democratic debates thus far in this cycle have come near to the 24 million viewership figure posted by Donald Trump’s first debate on Fox News in August of 2015.
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Post by Admin on Feb 25, 2020 22:50:04 GMT
CBS News hosts the 10th Democratic presidential primary debate on Feb. 25 from 8 p.m. to 10 p.m. ET in Charleston, South Carolina, just days ahead of the state's primary on Feb. 29. The candidates who qualified are former Vice President Joe Biden, former New York City Mayor Mike Bloomberg, former South Bend Mayor Pete Buttigieg, Minnesota Senator Amy Klobuchar, Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders, billionaire investor Tom Steyer and Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren. "CBS Evening News" anchor and managing editor Norah O'Donnell and "CBS This Morning" co-host Gayle King are moderating the debate and will be joined in questioning by "Face the Nation" moderator and senior foreign affairs correspondent Margaret Brennan, chief Washington correspondent Major Garrett and "60 Minutes" correspondent Bill Whitaker. CBS News and CBSN will air post-debate live coverage hosted by Elaine Quijano, anchor of CBSN's "Red & Blue," and political correspondent Ed O'Keefe beginning at 10 p.m., featuring live interviews with the candidates, surrogates and other newsmakers, plus in-depth analysis and reporting from the team of CBS News journalists and contributors in Charleston. --
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