Facts First: Bloomberg misleads at CNN town hall on his ‘Democratic credentials’

Democratic presidential candidate Mike Bloomberg strongly suggested on Wednesday at his CNN presidential town hall he had supported Barack Obama in both the 2008 and 2012 presidential election.

Bloomberg made the comments in response to a question from CNN’s Anderson Cooper about why Democratic voters should trust Bloomberg, who only rejoined the party in 2018 after tenures as both a Republican and independent.

Bloomberg misleadingly cited comments he made in support of healthcare reform in March 2009 to show he supported Obamacare, a bill he later harshly criticized.

“If you want to know my Democratic credentials, I spoke for Hillary Clinton at the DNC convention in Philadelphia in 2016,” Bloomberg said. “I certainly supported Barack Obama and Joe Biden. He says ‘no,’ but I was there both times for them, thank you very much. I campaigned among the Conference of Mayors for the Affordable Care Act, Obamacare.”

Bloomberg also tweeted a video of his answer on Wednesday, “if you want my Democratic credentials here they are.”

Facts first: Bloomberg supported Obama in 2012, not 2008. At a private event in 2016 he called his 2012 endorsement “backhanded,” saying he thought Romney could have done a better job as president. During his speech at the Democratic National Committee in 2016, Bloomberg four times said he was there as an independent, and not there to endorse the party’s platform. Bloomberg did make comments in support of healthcare reform in 2009, but he later sharply criticized Obamacare, calling the final bill “a disgrace.”

Bloomberg’s campaign claims him being “there” for Obama was defending Obama once from false claims he was a Muslim, but his comments at his town hall didn’t make this clear.

Here are the facts:

Bloomberg did support President Barack Obama in 2012, writing an endorsement for him on Bloomberg View’s website in 2012. But in private remarks allegedly from a closed Goldman Sachs event at Yankee Stadium in 2016, Bloomberg downplayed the endorsement calling it “backhanded.”

“The second Obama election I wrote a very backhanded endorsement of Obama,” Bloomberg said. “Saying I thought he hadn’t done the right thing, hadn’t done, hadn’t been good at things that I think are important and Romney would be a better person at doing that. But Romney did not stick with the values that he had when he was governor of Massachusetts.”

He added he did not support Obama in 2008.

“John McCain campaigned for me on the streets of Brooklyn back in 2001,” Bloomberg said. “I don’t know who set it up, but he did. And I wasn’t going to go against him, but I quite honestly, I would’ve never voted for him because of Sarah Palin on the ticket. So I stayed out of that election.”

Bloomberg’s campaign spokesman Stu Loeser, did not dispute that Bloomberg did not support Obama in the 2008 election. Instead, Loeser cited remarks that Bloomberg made in 2008 where he said that rumors Obama was a Muslim were “lies.” The comments came at during a fight over delegates between Clinton and Obama.

“To be clear, we are not saying that Mike helped Obama win, but he DID support Senator Obama in Florida when the Clinton campaign was still fighting him,” Loeser emailed CNN.

Bloomberg’s past comments on the Affordable Care Act were covered in a KFile article earlier this month.

Bloomberg did speak in favor of health care reform in March 2009, as he mentioned at the town hall.

But in comments made months after Obamacare was passed in April 2010, Bloomberg said the bill would do “absolutely nothing to fix the big health care problems” and also called the program “a disgrace.” He added it was “another program that’s going to cost a lot more money.”

It was just one of several comments from Bloomberg identified by CNN’s KFile criticizing the landmark Affordable Care Act in the years following its passage, including saying the bill was “really dysfunctional” and did nothing to solve rising health care costs.

Bloomberg has now fully embraced the Affordable Care Act, even proposing an additional “Medicare-like public option” that builds on the law.

And while Bloomberg did speak at the Democratic National Convention for Clinton, here’s what he said in his opening remarks.

“I’m not here as a member of any party, or to endorse any party platform,” he said. “I am here for one reason, and one reason only: to explain why I believe it is my imperative that we elect Hillary Clinton as the next president of the United States. And to ask you to join with me in supporting her this November.’