Reuters/ Eduardo Munoz
Bloomberg said in the interview that the New York Times was "right" in their endorsements of Democrat Christine Quinn and Republican Joe Lhota in the mayoral race. Then he was asked by New York Magazine's Chris Smith about de Blasio.
Bloomberg said de Blasio was running a "racist" campaign, and he ripped de Blasio's strategy as one of "division."
Here's the exchange:
Q: Then there's Bill de Blasio, who's become the Democratic front-runner. He has in some ways been running a class-warfare campaign-
Class-warfare and racist.
Q: Racist?
I mean he's making an appeal using his family to gain support. I think it's pretty obvious to anyone watching what he's been doing. I do not think he himself is racist. It's comparable to me pointing out I'm Jewish in attracting the Jewish vote. You tailor messages to your audiences and address issues you think your audience cares about.
But his whole campaign is that there are two different cities here. And I've never liked that kind of division. The way to help those who are less fortunate is, number one, to attract more very fortunate people. They are the ones that pay the bills. The people that would get very badly hurt here if you drive out the very wealthy are the people he professes to try to help. Tearing people apart with this "two cities" thing doesn't make any sense to me. It's a destructive strategy for those you want to help the most. He's a very populist, very left-wing guy, but this city is not two groups, and if to some extent it is, it's one group paying for services for the other.
De Blasio's campaign didn't immediately respond to a request for comment.