let's talk about Mike Bloomberg world's
ninth richest person former mayor of New
York and a man who wants to be President
Barry mind he doesn't officially arrive
on the ballot until March the third
that's Super Tuesday when the Democratic
Party is going to hold primaries across
14 states but he's very much in this
race already you may have seen on
Wednesday Donald Trump saying he's not
worried about mr. Bloomberg he's more
worried about facing Bernie Sanders but
today the president tweeted mini Mike is
a 5 for 5 for massive dead energy who
doesn't want to be on the debate stage
with these professional politicians he
hates crazy Bernie and will with enough
money possibly stop him Bernie's people
will go nuts to which Michael Bloomberg
replied directly to the president Donald
Trump we know many of the same people in
New York behind your back they laugh at
you and call you a carnival barking
clown they know you inherited a fortune
and squandered it with stupid deals and
incompetence I have the record and
resources to defeat you and I will so
the two men are obviously getting on
well it's evident mr. Bloomberg sees the
president's wealth as an attack line
have a look at this last week you think
people are interested in seeing two
billionaires find out who's the second
one Touche
well here's the BBC's North America
correspondent Anthony zerk and you gotta
remember these two individuals have
history that goes back decades in New
York City so the fact that this is
becoming personal in a kind of a New
York City politics stored away trading
insults I guess that shouldn't be too
surprising but it's a fight that Michael
Bloomberg is looking for he's seeking
this out because I think he views as
elevating his standing among the
Democrats proving that he's someone who
could go toe-to-toe with Donald Trump
and fight him in his own element on
social media and come out the better for
it other candidates have tried certainly
but generally it's very difficult to
take on Donald Trump in these sorts of
situations so we're in this curious
situation where he's campaigning but
he's not even on the ballot yet no he's
not on the ballot he is doing something
as unorthodox in the history of the
modern American presidential primary
politics and that skipping Iowa and New
Hampshire and the other early states and
focusing solely on these Super Tuesday
states the whole handful of states
across the country some of them very
large like Texas and California that are
holding their primaries the first
Tuesday in March and theory is he
doesn't need to build up steam in Iowa
or New Hampshire he doesn't need to make
a name for himself that way he has
virtually a limitless resources sixty
two billion dollars in personal wealth
that he can devote towards advertising
in these states like California like
Texas that are huge media markets that
none of the other candidates save for
maybe you know Bernie Sanders can
compete with because they just don't
have the campaign resources its
unconventional has never been tried
before but in theory it could work
because money is not an issue for him
money is not an issue and of course
elections aren't won by money alone but
it certainly helps and Michael
Bloomberg's already spent over 300
million dollars that's more than all the
other candidates put together more than
Barack Obama spent on his entire
campaign in 2012 and it's having an
impact here's one national poll from
earlier in the week Mike Bloomberg
they're on 15% that puts him third
behind Joe Biden who's currently going
down and down and Bernie Sanders who's
had a pretty good week also bear in mind
mr. Bloomberg saying he'll spend around
a billion dollars taking on Donald Trump
whether he's the Democratic candidate or
nods and much of that money is going on
targeted ads
his Steph kite from Axios on why the
Trump campaign really found this new way
to use Facebook to benefit the campaign
to push out ads they really figured out
a really unique trick and they they are
their king of this kind of campaign
advertising and so now we're seeing
Bloomberg who's spending even more than
Trump on Facebook ads and other and
other television ads and Network
advertising and continuing to go after
Trump one thing that we've noticed in a
lot of his ads is that he really does
present himself as a stark contrast to
Trump he goes after Trump's policies he
spends very little time going after
other Democratic candidates at this
point when pressed he will Bloomberg
will criticize in in kind of subtle ways
but he is really all about running the
general election he is running his
campaign as if it is him versus Donald
Trump and you see that a lot in the kind
of ads that he is that he's putting out
and he's not just focused on convention
advertising the Bloomberg campaign is
commissioned some of the Internet's top
fire or content creators to generate
content about him a group called mean
2020 has been engaged to create the
sponsored content particularly for
Instagram so here's one example on kale
salad a meme page with over three and a
half million followers it's in the
format of a message conversation between
mr. Bloomberg and the account owner mr.
Bloomberg says hello mr. salad can you
post this meme to make me seem cool to
which he says I'd like to be compared
with kale tough and tasteless but good
for you the page replies that isn't
funny which of course is true mr.
Bloomberg says I'll give you a billion
dollars and there's more like that
plenty of them all state they're
sponsored by Mike Bloomberg the
reactions been mixed this guy's saying
anyone sharing a probe Bloomberg meme is
forever cancelled please pass it on
others more impressed says I'm not a
Bloomberg fan but this strategy of
leaning into meme accounts in super
awkward ways on insta he's kind of great
well he's Anthony in Washington's
assessment the reality is that Michael
Bloomberg is running his presidential
campaign like a multi-billion dollar
media empire which he heads so it is a
different kind of a strategy but it
would when you have these kind of
resources that he has he can try
different avenues try different
experimental techniques that maybe
previous campaigns haven't tried or
haven't been applied to traditional
political campaigning I been talking
with some Bernie Sanders supporters over
the past week I was at his headquarters
just a couple nights ago in New
Hampshire and I brought up Michael
Bloomberg to them
and boy they do not like him I mean but
Bernie Sanders has campaigned against
billionaires over the course of the past
five years and for them to face the
prospect of a billionaires sinking
resources into these kind of advertising
campaigns and such a huge amount they
view it as just another example of a
system that's out to get their guy