Full interview with former New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg

[00:00:01] Speaker 1: We turn now to former New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, who is also Special Envoy to the United Nations for Climate Action. Welcome to the show. [00:00:09] Michael Bloomberg: Thank you for having me. [00:00:10] Speaker 1: You've decided to personally fill this funding gap that has resulted from President Trump's decision to withdraw the U.S. from the Paris climate change. [00:00:19] Michael Bloomberg: Well, I think the American people want us to do what's right. America made a commitment. And as an American, if the government's not going to do it, we all have responsibility. I'm able to do it. So yes, I'm going to send them a check for the monies that America had promised to the organization that measures climate change progress and how countries are doing and complying with their agreement. And they'll get the check, and so it'll be as though they got it from the federal government. [00:00:49] Speaker 1: How much money are we talking about, and is this a one-time pledge? [00:00:51] Michael Bloomberg: The U.S. owes 15 million, I think it was a commitment. I think they've already sent seven. Now they've agreed in the budget to send three, and so I'm going to send four and a half to make it, to get it to what we had completed, or three and a half and three and a half. [00:01:05] Speaker 1: So four and a half million dollars this year, will you do the same next? [00:01:09] Michael Bloomberg: We'll figure out. That hopefully by then President Trump will have changed his view, which would be great, and gone in and honored America's commitment because it's what's right for America and right for the world. [00:01:23] Speaker 1: So President Trump has been a huge critic of this Paris climate change accord. [00:01:27] Michael Bloomberg: Yeah, but he has been, but that doesn't mean he can't listen to others and change his mind. A person that doesn't change their mind isn't very smart. A person that listens to new facts. He changes his mind. And he's been known to change his mind. That is true. And I think what he'd be well advised to do, because it's the right thing to do, and probably would be good politically for him, although I'm not sure that that really is what should drive him, but he should change his mind and say, "Look, there really is a problem here. America is part of the problem. America is a big part of the solution, and we should go in and help the world stop a potential [00:02:05] Speaker 1: disaster." But is that the issue writ large, or is it this particular agreement? Because one of the criticisms of this agreement, the Paris climate change accord, is it's non-binding. It's basically not enforceable. And none of the developed nations who are part of it and signed on have actually met the benchmarks they set for themselves. So aren't you concerned that you're throwing some good money after bad? [00:02:24] Michael Bloomberg: Look, it's dangerous to keep doing what we're doing. If everybody would do the right thing, yes, it would be better. But if some people or some countries do the right thing, we all benefit from that. And so just because not everybody's going to reduce pollution, the fact that America can reduce pollution helps Americans and also citizens around the world. [00:02:45] Speaker 1: But the criticism is that industrialized nations aren't living up to those pledges. [00:02:49] Michael Bloomberg: I can't speak for other nations. All I know is that America, I believe, will meet its commitment by 2025 to reduce greenhouse gases by an agreed amount. And if we do it, hopefully other countries will do it as well. And if they don't do it, we still will have done something for Americans who breathe the air and who live with the effects of climate change, which are noticeable, measurable, and very worrisome. We've had some real hurricanes with people getting killed and enormous destruction of property here in this country. That's going to get worse and worse and worse unless we do something about it. So it's great if everybody helps, but at least we should do our share. And the fact that others don't is maybe more reason why we should do ours. [00:03:37] Speaker 1: Do you feel like you're filling a leadership gap for the United States? [00:03:40] Michael Bloomberg: Well, I think that this is what the American public, when you poll them, say they want to do. The American public understands that we're having floods where we used to have droughts and droughts where we used to have floods and trees that are getting killed because the beetles that eat them aren't being killed in the winters, which aren't cold enough anymore. And the insurance companies are going to go broke if they keep having to make these enormous settlements. And they want something done to protect themselves and their families. And they would like to see the American government do this. Every poll shows the same thing. And if the president has decided not to do it, and as I said, I hope he changes his mind, there's no reason why we as Americans can't come in, fill the gap. And so we've got companies and states and individuals all agreeing to step in, report to the United Nations what our progress is the way all the other countries are going to do it, fulfill our commitment to fund part of it. It's not a lot of money, but America made that commitment. And most importantly, to do the things that will keep temperatures from going up and really potentially changing our life for the worst. [00:04:49] Speaker 1: After the election, the president gave you his personal cell phone number. Why don't you call him? He listens to outside advisors. Why don't you try to persuade him yourself? [00:04:57] Michael Bloomberg: Well, I think when he watches this program on Sunday morning, he'll get a good, he'll get my views. [00:05:05] Speaker 1: But you don't want to try to personally persuade him on this? [00:05:08] Michael Bloomberg: I think his staff knows what we've been doing. And it's not just me. It's Jerry Brown from California. There's a lot of different people who are weighing in here. [00:05:18] Speaker 1: You've argued that in many ways, you know, the federal government is irrelevant on a number of these issues. [00:05:25] Speaker ?: Yes. [00:05:25] Speaker 1: You've been looking at local government, states and areas. [00:05:29] Michael Bloomberg: And individuals, companies and individuals. You and your household can do some things to make a difference. Turn off the air conditioner before you go out in the morning. Drive a more fuel efficient car. Get away from incandescent light bulbs. Get your roof white to reflect off the heat from the sun and reduce your cost of air conditioning. Companies can do some things. They can use solar panels to generate their own electricity. They can use more fuel efficient motors and drive more fuel efficient trucks and all of that kind of stuff. And that all makes a difference. And the federal government really has little to do with this. The biggest thing we're doing is closing coal-fired power plants. Over half of all the coal-fired power plants in the country have been closed or in the process of closing. And in fact, we have been closing coal-fired power plants at a faster rate since the president was elected than before then. [00:06:22] Speaker 1: And yet the president says that that kind of environmentalism, that kind of global trade, is taking good people out of work in those industries. It is. [00:06:31] Michael Bloomberg: That's a negative. Well, there's a small number of people who are losing their jobs and we have to provide training for them. But there's an awful lot more people who are getting jobs because of new technologies. But just think about it this way. We have a lot of soldiers. They don't have a lot to do. Nobody suggests we should go to war to give them something to do. And that's really a good analogy to this. I feel very sorry for the people who lose their jobs as technology changes. It's not just coal. It's retail. There's lots of empty stores in this country and that sort of thing. And we, as a society, have got to do something about it. So one of the things I'm doing is funding organizations that retrain people in the coal industry. And there's not very many of them. The big change in the coal industry is when we automated and stopped digging down and just started ripping off the top of a mountain. But we are retraining those people. And the federal government should give us more help to do that. But still, the fact is that coal is a very damaging thing to our environment. People are dying. There's probably 7,000 or 8,000 people, based on the modeling, that are dying in America every year. 100,000 around the world just from the effects of coal-fired power plants. And if I've got a job or a life, I know how to make that decision. [00:07:46] Speaker 1: How do you assess EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt? [00:07:49] Michael Bloomberg: Well, I don't know about all of the things that are alleged in terms of spending monies on things that he really shouldn't do. It's true. He should not do that. And we should stop that. His policies are not good for the world. To debunk science and walk away from it is just ridiculous. Even if you don't believe it, if there's a possibility that it's right, you have to take prophylactic actions to prevent a disaster. And what I do know is that a lot of kids go to the hospital with asthma attacks because we have a lot of junk we put in the air. I do know that a lot of people come down with stomach cancers because there's a lot of stuff that goes into the water. I do know that a lot of people's houses are being destroyed and they're getting killed in hurricanes and things like that. [00:08:40] Speaker 1: It sounds like you're saying he's not doing the job that he should be doing. [00:08:43] Michael Bloomberg: I don't think there's any question about that. He was hired. His job is to protect the environment, and he has walked away 100% from that, saying, the environment doesn't need protection, I'm going to try to protect jobs. That's not his job. [00:08:58] Speaker 1: Should he be fired? [00:09:00] Michael Bloomberg: That's up to the president to decide. If he could get Scott Pruitt to change his policies and do the things that the Congress that enabled his -- that created his agency wanted him to do, then if the president wants him as one of his staff, he can keep him. But it's -- the issue is that what he's doing is very damaging to your health and your children's health and mine. [00:09:26] Speaker 1: But he would say, and the administration would say, that criticisms like yours are just pure politics. That climate change is an issue has become so conflated with these culture wars and with the left. And that's what it's -- [00:09:39] Michael Bloomberg: If there's anybody that's conflating it and making it a political issue, it's this administration that's making it a political issue. Ninety-nine percent of all scientists, after peer review, say that something is happening in the world. It's changing. Everybody that looks outside their window can see that we have less snow here and more snow there and bigger storms and a whole bunch of things that -- oceans are rising. Things are changing, and you can't deny that. You have a right to your own opinions. You don't have a right to your own facts. And the science says this is happening. You can question whether or not it's going to happen fast or slow. You can question whether or not there aren't other things involved as well as pollutants being put in the air. But when you just track the following, 17 out of the 18 hottest years on record have been since the year 2000. Just think about that. The North Pole, it was above freezing in the middle of the winter a month ago. Something is going on, and we have to prepare for the worst. And if you were a business person and you said, I'm not going to do anything, I'll run the risk of our plant right by the water getting inundated, you'd be fired right away. We'd say, what do you mean? Build a wall, buy an insurance policy, have a backup plan, a backup facility, train your people. And we're not doing that. [00:11:03] Speaker 1: It sounds like in your description on the climate front, you see a real vacuum of leadership. Do you see that on some of these other issues that you have been quite active on? [00:11:14] Michael Bloomberg: Well, I think there's no leadership on keeping guns out of the hands of criminals, minors, and people with psychiatric problems, which this country should be ashamed that we're not doing. I think the Second Amendment gives you the right, and I'm happy it does. I suppose that we have the right to bear arms. I used to have a rifle, a .22 caliber rifle. I got my rifle merit badge on the Boy Scouts. But to let people who are dangerous have weapons is just not an intelligent thing to do. And all we have to do is have sensible background checks. In fact, the federal law requires background checks for every gun sale from a gun store. It does not cover gun shows and internet sales, because when the law was written, they didn't exist. Common sense says you just expand it to those other two categories. And in the 19 states that have done it at a statewide level, murders with guns are down dramatically. Suicides are down dramatically. It really does make a difference to just check and see before we let people buy guns. And when you poll the public, overwhelmingly, 80, 90 percent, including NRA members and gun owners, think we should not allow people who are minors, people that have criminal records, or people that have psychiatric problems to buy guns. [00:12:39] Speaker 1: Yet it seems there was a conversation about all of those things you just listed in the wake of the Parkland school shooting and that student movement. What happened to that? It seems like the momentum has slowed. [00:12:51] Michael Bloomberg: Well, we'll see whether in the next election cycle what the students try to do is to say to people go out and vote, and vote based on this issue. We'll see whether that happens. I hope it does. [00:13:03] Speaker 1: And one of your organizations, Everytown for Gun Safety, is focused very much Absolutely. On mobilizing those younger voters. Absolutely. [00:13:08] Michael Bloomberg: What we're focusing on is more at the state level. And we've got 18 states that have enacted gun background checks, a 19 state that has voted for it, but the governor, this is in Nevada, the governor has refused to enforce the law. But in those states, suicide rate with guns, for example, is half the national average. This really does make a difference. And so we're working at the state level, but I hope the fact that these young people came out and had their say that people listen to them and they don't want to have a risk when they go to school. Nor do you want to just be in the streets and have somebody shoot you. [00:13:45] Speaker 1: But do you need to do something between now and November for that to actually matter at the ballot box when it comes to these congressional risks? [00:13:52] Michael Bloomberg: I think all of us have a responsibility between now and then. Call your congressman, call your senator and say, we want you to do something about this. I don't want to have my child at risk. I don't want to personally be at risk from crazy people who shouldn't have guns. They're not trying to take guns away from anybody else, as long as they use them responsibly. And states write issues whether you can carry or not. Every state has a different view, and that's the way the law works. But we can't just sit here and hope that it's going to happen. We have to continue on the fight that the young people started after this event. And you're right. After Parkland. And there have been a number of these cases where, after this, we say, that's enough. It's never going to happen again. And it does happen again. But someday, one time, it is going to stop. And I don't know if it's this time or the next time. God help us if it just keeps going on. We just got to stop the carnage. [00:14:50] Speaker 1: At the DNC in 2016, you called Donald Trump a risky, reckless, and radical choice. And the country, you said, couldn't afford to make that mistake. Did I say that? It was a memorable quote. Has he done anything to make you reconsider that? [00:15:07] Michael Bloomberg: I don't know that you're helping anything by going and criticizing somebody. Donald Trump was elected, had got 63-odd million votes. And I've said this before, I want him to do a good job. He is our duly elected president. I did not think he was the right choice in the binary choice between Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton. [00:15:30] Speaker 1: Do you think he's doing a good job? [00:15:32] Michael Bloomberg: I think he's -- it's -- I would give him an incomplete grade. Some of the things that he's done, I don't agree with the style of changing your mind every day and leaving your staffs out there to be -- make embarrassing things that you don't back them up, and the turnover in the administration is really dangerous and worrisome, not fair to people. But, you know, to criticize him doesn't advance anything. To give him some advice as to what I think he should do, that I'm happy to do. You pick the subject, I'll tell you what I think he should do. But I don't -- we have too much of the personal vindictiveness. And even when it's somebody that you don't support and didn't vote for, that doesn't change it. We should -- it's the old do-as-you to other people the way you'd want them to do it to you. And so I think we should not spend our time on personal attacks. We should talk about policy only. [00:16:31] Speaker 1: But his compelling case was that he came from the world of business, as you did. [00:16:36] Michael Bloomberg: No, he didn't. He was a real estate developer. He was -- he didn't manage large numbers of people. He didn't run big organizations. He was, I gather, a reasonably successful real estate developer, which is just a different occupation. It's not really a business person. [00:16:54] Speaker 1: And do you see, though -- I mean, you're drawing a distinction there. Do you see some management issues then? When you say -- [00:17:00] Michael Bloomberg: Oh, I don't think there's any question that -- [00:17:02] Speaker 1: The hiring, the firing, the -- [00:17:04] Michael Bloomberg: Management is not something you -- it's like skiing. You don't read a book on skiing and then go out and ski double black diamonds. Management is something you learn over a period of time. And you have to manage larger and larger groups of people and make more and more difficult decisions and live with those decisions as you go. This president does not have experience in running large organizations or facing a lot of the issues that he has to face. And the one time I talked to him after he got elected, my advice to him was get people, regardless of their political persuasion, who have expertise in each of these areas that you're not an expert on -- defense and business and economics and international relations, et cetera, et cetera -- and give them authority to go along with responsibility and then let them do it even when there are things that you don't agree with. You can't agree with everything. And you will never attract good people unless you let them have their head and do some things and make decisions. And when they make decisions that you don't necessarily agree with or that don't turn out to be the right decisions, you have to back them up. If you don't pay -- if you don't give people the confidence that you're going to have their backs, would be the expression we would use, you're not going to get good people and you're not going to keep them. [00:18:23] Speaker 1: And you don't see an evolution in that leadership. It doesn't sound like he took your advice. [00:18:28] Michael Bloomberg: My advice to him was to build a team right away because it gets more difficult as you get into your administration and there's always going to be some turnover and people don't get a chance to start at the beginning. And he did not choose to do that. He tried to pass a few pieces of legislation more importantly than building the team. The trouble is that the piece of legislation comes and goes and the team stays with you or you have chaos and turnover like we've had unfortunately. Very dangerous and very difficult to run when you don't have experts. So if he's going to go and go to China and have a negotiation with Xi Jinping, he's got to get some very deep advice from a lot of people and we don't have anybody left in the State Department. They've all disappeared or fired or quit. So I don't know where you go to get that advice. China would have 50 people studying each of our elected officials and we have nobody studying the whole country. [00:19:27] Speaker 1: Consumer confidence is up. The market's doing well. [00:19:29] Michael Bloomberg: That is true. [00:19:30] Speaker 1: Unemployment is down. Do you give him credit for that? I mean, you were critical as a candidate of his lack of expertise. [00:19:38] Michael Bloomberg: I think we certainly shouldn't hold -- he's done some things, the tax cut, the part where we cut taxes for corporations made a lot of sense. The part where we cut taxes for individuals took away the money we needed for infrastructure. And we need infrastructure a lot more for the future of this country than we need a tax decrease. Nobody wants to pay less taxes, I understand that. But if you're going to have good people, you've got to pay them. If you're going to have infrastructure, you've got to pay for it. And we've not done that. We've gone in the other direction. So I think the tax bill was one plus, one minus. I think that a lot of the things that he has talked about -- one day we're out of TPP, the next day we want to go back into a trade pact that was designed to help America against Chinese competition. And now, unfortunately, it's been turned around and it's going to help China against competition from America. And that's why I had disagreements with Hillary Clinton, who walked away from it, and Donald Trump, who's walked away from it. [00:20:43] Speaker 1: Now, you're an independent. You've been a Democrat. You've been a Republican. [00:20:47] Michael Bloomberg: I know something about partisan politics. I've been them all. [00:20:49] Speaker 1: So do you see any candidates in any of those parties right now that you see embodying the kind of leadership you want to support and would support in 2020? [00:21:00] Michael Bloomberg: I think if you look back at history, it is such a long time from this point in this cycle until the election that, I bet you $0.25, the candidate that gets the nomination isn't even mentioned today. There's going to be less. [00:21:14] Speaker 1: So you haven't found anyone at these local levels. [00:21:15] Michael Bloomberg: Well, there's some very competent people out there, but it's a long ways away. Two years before the next election is a lifetime in politics. [00:21:24] Speaker 1: But you're a data guy. I mean, you've been looking at so many of these mayors. You've been looking at these governors, the work they're doing, the research you're gathering. [00:21:33] Michael Bloomberg: Yes. [00:21:34] Speaker 1: Some people look at that and say that looks like a political operation. [00:21:36] Michael Bloomberg: Well, I don't know about that. I don't think it is. It's because I'm trying personally to make a difference. I have a great company. I've got a great family. And I also want to contribute back. I was taught that this is what you do when you get wealthy. You give the money back. And all of the company's profits go to the foundation. And we're trying to do things all around the world, but also in America. But when you talk about who's going to -- who should be the next president, and you mentioned it earlier, you have to have experience. And just a good policy is not a reason to elect somebody. Whatever the policy decisions they're going to have to make down the road, we don't even know what they're going to be now. You have to wait and see. What I want is somebody who has experience in managing people, because it is a management job. Four million people work for the president of the United States. You've got to be able to manage. You've got to be able to attract the staff. You've got to know how to promote people and scent people and get them to work together. The president's job is to some extent to get Congress to work together. Two sides of the aisle, they refuse to talk to each other. It's the president's responsibility to go in and get them to talk together. You're going to say, how do you do that? That's up to the president. I know how I would do it. He's got to find a way he should do it. Bill Clinton actually did a decent amount of that, more so than any other past presidents. But you've got to pick somebody that has the skills that we need and not the policies that you're going to ask them for. Every one of these policies are not the ones that they're going to have to face down the road. But let's focus on what we really need. You need a manager. You need a leader. You need somebody who can say, look, this is where we should go. Let me convince you, and I'm going to lead you to that result. Not the polls say, you want to go someplace, I'll follow you there. It's not leadership, and the world is too dangerous and changing too fast, and we have too many competitors and social problems and medical problems and education problems and crime and all of these things. We've just got to be able to address these issues. And what you don't do is to say to Congress, you write a bill. And then I'll tweak it a little bit. You say to Congress, here is a bill. I've consulted with the best people I could find. I've gotten all the experts. We've gone around and we've made a number of different iterations until we get something that we think will work. Now let me show you why I think it's going to work and why you should vote for this. And you, the public, why I think this is going to work and why you should support this and pay for it. Remember, it's the public's money that we're spending. And it's the public are the people that get helped or hurt by all of these views. But it's not just take a poll and okay, I'll be there for you. That's the wrong ways to go. And I think we've done that many, many two times in the recent past. [00:24:29] Speaker 1: Because you're a numbers guy, what are the odds you'd put on you deciding to run? [00:24:35] Michael Bloomberg: Not very high. You know, look, I've got a chance- Not very high, but not zero. Well, if God said I'd appoint you, I think it would be a great challenge and you'd have to think long and hard and, you know, you're physically able to do it. And you think, do you think you can attract the right people? Because it's not going to be you. It's the staff that you're going to build that team that I talked about. But at the moment, I'm not running for president. I'm trying to do as good a job as I can. I'm interested in public education. I think the education system in our country is going in the wrong direction. And if you want to help people, a better education is what they need. The spoils are going to go to the people that are better educated. And we are doing a terrible job, particularly among poor people who are not getting the education they need to work themselves out of poverty. They're in this cycle. Their families were poor. Their grandparents' families go back. We've got to get them out of that cycle. Education is the key. And our school systems are getting worse, not better. We've got to find programs where people can get jobs. We've got to create jobs in a world where artificial intelligence and other kinds of technology are destroying jobs. But there are opportunities to do it. There are a number of ways you can incent people to move to a better job or become more productive. And we have policies that restrict you from doing that or discourage you from doing that. We have defense issues around the world. We have potential things that could damage or destroy our country. We've got to build alliances around the world and do those kinds of things. And I think I can, as a private citizen, help in some of those things. And that's what I want to do with my life. [00:26:11] Speaker 1: That also sounds like a platform. [00:26:13] Michael Bloomberg: Well, anything you say, it could be a platform. I don't know that it's -- do I think that the President of the United States should do those things? Of course I think the President of the United States should do those things. But he's not -- or she's not the only one that can do those things. [00:26:27] Speaker 1: Well, we'll have to see what you choose to do next, Mayor. Thank you very much. [00:26:32] Michael Bloomberg: All the best. [00:26:33] Speaker ?: Thank you for having me.