‘It’s A Hard No’: Bernie Sanders Won’t Take Money From Bloomberg If He Wins Democratic Nomination

Jeff Weaver, a senior adviser for Bernie Sanders campaign, told reporters that the Independent Vermont Senator would not take money from fellow candidate Mike Bloomberg if he was picked as the Democratic nominee.

“It’s a hard no,” Weaver told NBC News after Tuesday night’s debate. “Bernie has said he’s going to fund his presidential campaign with small-dollar contributions, and I think we can do that.”

Bloomberg has said he’ll give at least one billion of his $61.9 billion net worth to defeat Donald Trump. Last week, Pete Buttigieg said he would take Bloomberg’s money if he was named the nominee. But Sanders has long said he wouldn’t take money from billionaires.

Sanders dodged the question at last week’s CNN town hall, but Weaver made it clear that Sanders won’t be taking Bloomberg’s money on Tuesday.

Following the comments from Weaver, Bloomberg spokesperson Howard Wolfson said, “Bernie said he didn’t want [Bloomberg’s] money, so we’re not going to. I don’t think it would be prudent to spend on behalf of somebody who didn’t want it.”

New York Magazine’s Jonathan Chait juggled with the decision in a column, where he wrote, “If you truly, deeply object to the idea of billionaires exerting disproportionate influence over political campaigns to the point that you’d rather lose than let one of them help you, then Sanders deserves credit for ideological consistency. But Democrats should consider the possibility that Sanders is not merely pretending to be a fanatic.”