Late Night Asks if We Really Need More Rich Guys in the 2020 Race

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/11/12/arts/television/late-night-bloomberg-election-2020.html

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The former mayor of New York City, Michael Bloomberg, made what Trevor Noah called a “fashionably late entrance” into the 2020 election last week, filing paperwork for the presidential primary in Alabama.

“Yes, Michael Bloomberg, former New York City mayor and world’s richest house elf is on the verge of jumping into the Democratic primary because he doesn’t think any of the current candidates can beat Trump. And you have to admit, that’s such a billionaire thing to do, right?” — TREVOR NOAH

“Like, why do billionaires always do this, you know? It’s not just him — look at Bruce Wayne. Gotham’s crime was out of control. Instead of complaining about the cops, he was like, ‘Alfred, build me a car that shoots grenades — I’ll do it myself!’” — TREVOR NOAH

“And I see what Bernie and other Democrats are saying. The only reason it’s even possible for Bloomberg to jump into the race so late isn’t because he has like a groundswell of popular support behind him, it’s that he has $53 billion to spend. Yeah, $53 billion. With that amount of money, Bloomberg could keep cloning different versions of himself until he finds the most electable one. He could be like: ‘How about a tall Bloomberg? Or how about a buff Bloomberg? What about a black Bloomberg? Oh no! Now I have to stop and frisk myself!’” — TREVOR NOAH

“Why doesn’t he just tell everyone if they vote for him they get $20?” — DESUS NICE

“You’ve been watching the rampant corruption of the Trump presidency, the catastrophic failure of the Trump administration and the destructive influence the wealthy have had on politics and you’re saying to yourself, ‘You know what can fix this? A different rich guy.’ Because if we’ve learned one thing from the past decade of politics, from the financial crisis to the Trump presidency, it’s that rich people, with zero exceptions, know what they’re doing. That’s why they always do smart, sane things like leaving all their money to their cats or going on a podcast and smoking weed like Elon Musk.” — SETH MEYERS

Over the weekend, a Bloomberg representative confirmed to reporters that Amazon’s founder and chief executive, Jeff Bezos, had encouraged the former mayor to consider a presidential run.

“Wow, he just ordered up a presidential candidate. What level of Amazon Prime is that?” — SETH MEYERS

“You know you’re rich when the Amazon guy orders something from you. That’s money!” — TREVOR NOAH

“Well, maybe all he needed was a little push from another member of the .00001 percent.” — TREVOR NOAH

“Over the weekend, Trump tweeted: ‘I will be announcing the winners of the MAGA challenge and inviting them to the White House to meet with me and perform. Good luck.’ Now, this is a challenge that was started by a rapper named B. Serious. His idea is that he wants people to write and perform pro-Trump rap songs. B. Serious said he wants to help get the word out about Trump. He’s been under the radar for far too long. We need to get this man some publicity.” — JIMMY KIMMEL

“Trump said he’s going to meet the winners of the contest at the White House, which means he definitely won’t meet the winners of the contest at the White House.” — JIMMY KIMMEL

“But there’s nothing more Donald Trumpian than taking time in the middle of your impeachment hearing to judge a rap contest.” — JIMMY KIMMEL

On Monday night, Desus and Mero were joined by Desus’ former junior high classmate, the MSNBC host Chris Hayes.

Lizzy Caplan will be on “Conan” to talk about joining Season 2 of the Hulu series “Castle Rock.”

Authors like Stephen King, Ann Patchett and Lee Child have some peculiar things available to fans on their websites.