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CEO Howard Schultz has received a barrage of criticism from Democrats concerning the prospect of a Schultz presidential run as an independent, for fear his candidacy would result in the re-election of President Donald Trump. One of the few billionaires who’s mulled an independent presidential run himself agrees. Michael Bloomberg, the former New York City mayor, said in a statement on his website that he’s looked at the polling and concluded there’s no way an independent can win:
‘The data was very clear and very consistent. Given the strong pull of partisanship and the realities of the electoral college system, there is no way an independent can win. That is truer today than ever before.’
Michael Bloomberg
Bloomberg continued: “In 2020, the great likelihood is that an independent would just split the anti-Trump vote and end up re-electing the President. That’s a risk I refused to run in 2016 and we can’t afford to run it now.” Axios quoted a Schultz adviser as disagreeing[2] and reportedly pointing to research finding a centrist independent would pull votes evenly from the Republican and Democratic nominees. Polling expert Nate Silver, no fan of Schultz’s candidacy, agrees that a centrist would draw equally from both camps:
The problem is that your analysis of history is wrong. Nader hurt Gore because he was a leftist 3rd party candidate. The centrists didn't affect things much. Johnson (2016), Perot (1996, 1992), Anderson (1980) all drew about equally from both major-party candidates. https://t.co/5r8oTjQSpy[3]...
— Nate Silver (@NateSilver538) January 28, 2019[4]
References
- ^ SBUX, -0.55% (www.marketwatch.com)
- ^ quoted a Schultz adviser as disagreeing (www.axios.com)
- ^ https://t.co/5r8oTjQSpy (t.co)
- ^ January 28, 2019 (twitter.com)