Billionaire and former New York City mayor, Michael Bloomberg, officially announced his presidential campaign last Sunday. Bloomberg was rumored to be joining the race over the last few months, but made it official when he launched his official campaign website, and spent an estimated 30 million dollars on T.V. ads; which was the largest campaign purchase in the 2020 race so far. 

“I’m running for president to defeat Donald Trump and rebuild America. We cannot afford four more years of President Trump’s reckless and unethical actions. He represents an existential threat to our country and our values,” Bloomberg declared in a statement Sunday. “If he wins another term in office, we may never recover from the damage.”

Earlier this year, Bloomberg revealed that he would not run, but now has reversed his decision. Many aides close to the billionaire have told media sources that the decision was made in fear that he was afraid that there wasn’t any candidate in the current field of Democrats who can beat Trump next November. 

Now that Bloomberg has officially entered the race, the billionaire has faced many criticisms from other candidates and political analysts. Most notably, Bloomberg has received harsh words from candidates Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren, whose campaign goals are directly associated with taking political influence from the elites of the United States. 

“I’m disgusted by the idea that Michael Bloomberg or any billionaire thinks they can circumvent the political process and spend tens of millions of dollars to buy elections,” Sanders said earlier this month. 

This criticism of Bloomberg grew over the weekend when it became clear that Bloomberg was slated to spend tens of millions of dollars on ads at the outset of his campaign.

“I see this as one more example where how come when you have someone who is already a multimillionaire in the White House do you think that the people in this country are going to go, ‘Oh, we need someone wealthier,'” Minnesota Sen. Amy Klobuchar said in New Hampshire on Saturday.

Bloomberg currently ranks as the 9th wealthiest person in the United States, and the 14th wealthiest person in the world, with an estimated net worth of $58 billion dollars. The 77-year-old entrepreneur and philanthropist made his fortune by helping create technology that bankers and traders could use to access market data. After building a successful financial information business, Bloomberg turned to politics. In 2001, he officially launched a bid to become mayor of New York. Despite running as a Republican in an overwhelmingly Democratic city, Bloomberg won the election and was reelected twice. During this second term, he switched parties and became an independent — only to re-register as a Democrat in 2018.

Bloomberg is set to make his first national television appearance as a candidate on December 19, when the sixth Democratic presidential debate will be live from Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles. Currently, Bloomberg has yet to make the requirements set for participating in the debate, but his campaign has until December 12th to reach the set expectations. 

Many sources close to the campaign have also said that Bloomberg and campaign have decided to forgo competing in early voting states and instead focus his resources on Super Tuesday, when 15 states head to the polls March 3. His aides believe the strategy will help him lay claim to delegate-rich territory that has been somewhat overlooked as the top-tier candidates focus their energies in Iowa, New Hampshire, South Carolina and Nevada. Whether this late presidential bid will work or not, we will see in the upcoming months as primaries and caucuses are just a few months away.