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Michael Bloomberg’s presidential campaign is hiring hundreds of workers in California to post regularly on their personal social-media accounts in support of the candidate and send text messages to their friends about him. The effort, which could cost millions of dollars, is launching ahead of California’s March 3 primary and could later be deployed nationwide, according to people familiar with the matter and documents reviewed by The Wall Street Journal. It is one of the most unorthodox yet by the heavy-spending billionaire and blurs the lines between traditional campaign organizing and the distribution of sponsored content. Most campaigns encourage their...

The battle of the Democrat money men running for president is playing out in high-roller Las Vegas as billionaire Mike Bloomberg replaces billionaire Tom Steyer on the debate stage Wednesday night. Steyer did not meet the Democratic National Committee’s (DNC) threshold by the Tuesday midnight deadline. And while voters can cast their ballot for Steyer in Nevada, Bloomberg’s name is not one of the candidates on it. Steyer, who took part in the fourth, fifth, sixth, seventh and eighth debates is not happy about the development, Politico reports: Steyer’s campaign has cried foul at his likely exclusion, arguing that his...

RENO, Nevada — A new poll shows Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) surging to a double-digit lead over his rivals nationwide — and billionaire Mike Bloomberg qualifying for Wednesday’s Democrat debate. The National Public Radio/Marist/PBS Newshour poll, released early Tuesday morning, shows Sanders with 31%, far ahead of Bloomberg, who is in second place with 19%. The poll was conducted Feb. 13-16 — i.e. after the New Hampshire primary — on land lines and mobile phones among a sample of 527 “Democrats and Democratic leaning independents” registered to vote, with a 5.4% margin of error. The poll shows that Sanders is...

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Former New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg on Tuesday qualified for this week’s Democratic presidential debate in Nevada, putting him on the same stage as his rivals for the first tie in the race for the party’s nomination. The debate on Wednesday will be the ninth in the contest for who will challenge Republican President Donald Trump in the Nov. 3 election. A late entry to the race, Bloomberg, 78, has risen in public opinion polls as he pours money from his estimated $60 billion personal fortune into a national campaign, spending hundreds of millions of dollars on...

Former New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg and Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) are running neck-and-neck for the top spot in Virginia’s upcoming Democratic presidential primary, according to a Monmouth University survey released early Tuesday. The poll shows Bloomberg and Sanders tied in the Old Dominion at 22 percent, followed by former Vice President Joe Biden at 18 percent. Only one other candidate, former South Bend, Ind,. Mayor Pete Buttigieg, registered double-digit support in the commonwealth at 11 percent

When 18-year-old NASCAR star Hailie Deegan heard that President Donald Trump was going to attend the Daytona 500, she went on a quest to get Trump to sign her helmet. It was a quest that only the president’s son could facilitate. Ahead of the big race, Deegan jumped to Twitter to let fans know that she was in the hunt for the president’s autograph. Hailie Deegan ✔ @HailieDeegan Today’s goal. Get my helmet signed by Trump https://twitter.com/realdonaldtrump/status/1228810073171951621 … Donald J. Trump ✔ @realDonaldTrump Remember, will be at Daytona 500 tomorrow! Amusingly, Don Trump, Jr., saw the tweet and made one...

China’s use of foreign media, Franco’s amateurish and heavy-handed attempts notwithstanding, are becoming increasingly sophisticated and the CCP is recruiting foreign faces for those platforms as well, especially on YouTube. Even in China, where YouTube is illegal, China’s government is using westerners to push the party line and suppress contradicting information. Westerners on those platforms outside of China, like J.J., and even inside China itself, have reported attempts by individuals to sponsor their platforms and secure them massive audiences on Chinese platforms in exchange for editorial control over a new, pro-CCP message.

Paranoia and fear about an epidemic are often worse than the disease itself. If you want to get a taste of the insanity provoked by the new coronavirus, look no further than US Republican Senator Tom Cotton. As I discussed on Sunday, there has been a conspiracy theory circulating in social media and fringe media groups in the United States claiming the virus was bioengineered as a weapon by the Chinese but was accidentally leaked into the population. This is because the epicentre of the outbreak is near the Wuhan Institute of Virology, which is certified to handle the world’s...

WASHINGTON — At the height of the 2008 economic collapse, then-New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg said the elimination of a discriminatory housing practice known as “redlining” was responsible for instigating the meltdown. “It all started back when there was a lot of pressure on banks to make loans to everyone,” Bloomberg, now a Democratic presidential candidate, said at a forum that was hosted by Georgetown University in September 2008. “Redlining, if you remember, was the term where banks took whole neighborhoods and said, ‘People in these neighborhoods are poor, they’re not going to be able to pay off their mortgages,...

Subtitle: The former New York mayor's campaign has been reaching out to key party influencers, including some who support his rivals. WASHINGTON -- Michael Bloomberg may be absent from the early-state ballots, but behind the scenes, he has been using his wealth and influence to undermine the rest of the Democratic field. As the other candidates for the Democratic presidential nomination trudged through Iowa and New Hampshire in the early weeks of this year, Bloomberg, the former mayor of New York, has doubled his planned spending on television ads, expanded his staff several times over and started aggressively courting key...

39 new cases in Japan. They were found on the “Diamond Princess” cruise ship off Yokohama, raising the ship’s total to 174.

The coronavirus epidemic could spread to about two-thirds of the world’s population if it cannot be controlled, according to Hong Kong’s leading public health epidemiologist. His warning came after the head of the World Health Organization (WHO) said recent cases of coronavirus patients who had never visited China could be the “tip of the iceberg”. Prof Gabriel Leung, the chair of public health medicine at Hong Kong University, said the overriding question was to figure out the size and shape of the iceberg. Most experts thought that each person infected would go on to transmit the virus to about 2.5...

A political tragedy is now unfolding here in America, the self-immolation of the Democratic Party. It is happening. ... Way back in the spring, they decided that this election would amount to an Obama restoration. By beating President Trump we could all return to the world before Trump. Joe Biden was the designated leader of this kind of revolution. It's a little hard to believe, now that we say it out loud -- now that Biden is in danger of finishing fifth on Tuesday in New Hampshire. But that's what they really thought -- that Biden could do it, and...

For all the breathless coverage, the New Hampshire Democratic primary is truly dinky — awarding only 24 pledged delegates, one percent of the 1,990 needed to win. That is even fewer than Iowa. It’s barely worth fighting for, except that, especially in the wake of the Iowa fiasco, New Hampshire will punch above its weight. The first four contests, including Nevada, will award a total of 155 pledged delegates. If the candidates perform as predicted by today’s polls, Sanders will lead on the cusp of Super Tuesday with 34 delegates, followed by Biden (33), Buttigieg (25) and Sen. Elizabeth Warren...

New Hampshire Dem Primary Early Results: Amy Klobuchar– 29.6% Bernie Sanders– 14.8% Elizabeth Warren– 14.8% Andrew Yang– 11.1% Joe Biden– 7.4% Pete Buttigieg– 7.4% Mike Bloomberg– 7.4% Tom Steyer– 3.7% Tulsi Gabbard– 3.7%

China has "removed" several senior officials over their handling of the coronavirus outbreak - as the death toll passed 1,000. The party secretary for the Hubei Health Commission, and the head of the commission, were among those who lost their jobs. They are the most senior officials to be demoted so far. The deputy director of the local Red Cross was also removed for "dereliction of duty" over "handling of donations". The two Hubei party officials will be replaced by a national figure - the deputy director of China's National Health Commission, Wang Hesheng. As well as being removed from...

High sulphur dioxide levels at the centre of the coronavirus outbreak could be a sign of mass cremations, it has been claimed. Satellite maps in recent days have shown alarming levels of SO2 around Wuhan, the Chinese city where the outbreak began. In addition, there were high sulphur dioxide levels in the city of Chongqing which is also under quarantine. Scientists say that sulphur dioxide is produced when bodies are cremated, and also when medical waste is incinerated. But social media users who investigated the maps have suggested that dead bodies could be being burned on the outskirts of the...

Chinese lives have undergone sudden changes as a result of the novel coronavirus epidemic. At the national level, Wuhan, capital of Central China's Hubei Province and the outbreak's epicenter, earlier announced a citywide closure to contain the virus. Many provinces and cities have implemented harsh but effective preventive measures. People have been told to remain indoors, and in some places, only one member from each family is allowed to go outside to buy daily necessities every other day or longer. In Beijing, residential communities have remained on high alert. Entrance gates are closed all day, with the exception of one...

A 35-year-old Washington, D.C., man visited an urgent care clinic on Jan. 19, a few days after returning from Wuhan, China. After undergoing testing, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention determined that he had contracted the 2019-nCoV coronavirus—the first such case in the United States. Since surfacing in Wuhan in December, the 2019-nCoV coronavirus has spread to nearly 30 countries, killing 565 and infecting more than 28,000 worldwide. As of this writing, 12 cases have been confirmed in the U.S. Note that these numbers are changing almost every hour. As cases began to emerge within American borders, the Trump...

Trump posted this video featuring a woman comparing him to Superman.