Trump gleefully taunted Bloomberg over his his disastrous first Democratic debate, saying it was the 'worst in the history of debates'

• President Donald Trump mocked Democratic presidential contender Mike Bloomberg after he endured a tough night in his first Democratic debate on Wednesday night.
• "Mini Mike Bloomberg's debate performance tonight was perhaps the worst in the history of debates, and there have been some really bad ones," tweeted the president early Thursday morning.
• Bloomberg had failed to defend himself against the barrage of attacks by his Democratic rivals, who focused on his record of sexist comments and controversial policies as Mayor of New York City.
• Bloomberg's campaign said the candidate "was just warming up tonight" and that he was still a winner.
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President Donald Trump on gleefully mocked Democratic presidential contender Mike Bloomberg as "stumbling, bumbling and grossly incompetent" after the former New York City mayor endured a tough night in his first Democratic debate in Las Vegas.

"Mini Mike Bloomberg's debate performance tonight was perhaps the worst in the history of debates, and there have been some really bad ones. He was stumbling, bumbling and grossly incompetent," the president tweeted early Thursday morning.

"If this doesn't knock him out of the race, nothing will. Not so easy to do what I did!"

Bloomberg was the focus of relentless attacks from his five Democratic rivals on Wednesday, and failed to adequately defend himself against them.

His most notable challenger was Sen. Elizabeth Warren, who attacked him over his record of sexist comments and challenged him to release former female employees from their nondisclosure agreements so they could openly discuss their sexual harassment lawsuits against his company.

Here is one of their exchanges:

Bloomberg: "We have a very few nondisclosure agreements."

Warren: "How many is that?"

Bloomberg: "Let me finish. None of them accuse me of doing anything other than, maybe they didn't like a joke I told."

His response provoked a groan from the audience.

Bloomberg has shaken up the Democratic presidential race since entering in November, and shot up to second in some national polls after pouring hundreds of millions of dollars into a slick advertising campaign and a large network of field operatives.

But on stage last night Bloomberg presented a more faltering figure than that familiar from his Twitter account, which has hit back at Trump's jibes with stinging one liners.

Bloomberg's campaign manager said that the candidate was "just warming up."

"You know you are a winner when you are drawing attacks from all the candidates. Everyone came to destroy Mike tonight," Kevin Sheekey said in a statement.

"He was just warming up tonight. We fully expect Mike will continue to build on tonight's performance when he appears on the stage in South Carolina next Tuesday."