Michael Bloomberg Fast Facts

Here is a look at the life of Michael Bloomberg, former New York mayor and 2020 Democratic presidential candidate.

Personal

Birth date: February 14, 1942

Birth place: Boston, Massachusetts

Birth name: Michael Rubens Bloomberg

Father: William Henry Bloomberg, bookkeeper

Mother: Charlotte (Rubens) Bloomberg, office manager

Marriage: Susan Brown (1976-1993, divorced)

Children: Georgina, 1983; Emma, 1979

Education: Johns Hopkins University, B.S. in electrical engineering, 1964; Harvard Business School, M.B.A., 1966

Religion: Jewish

Other Facts

One of four New York City mayors to serve three terms.

Left the Democratic party in 2001 and won his first two mayoral terms as a Republican. His third mayoral term was won as an independent, and then he rejoined the Democratic party in 2018.

Diana Taylor has been his companion for 20 years.

As mayor of New York, Bloomberg made sweeping changes to city schools, transportation, including extending subway lines, and public health, implementing extensive regulations targeting smoking and obesity.

Since 2006, Bloomberg Philanthropies, an umbrella organization of Bloomberg’s charities which includes the nonprofit Bloomberg Family Foundation, has donated billions to political interests and causes such as education, the environment and public health.

Timeline

1966-1981 – Works as a clerk, and later partner at Salomon Brothers in New York.

1981 – Co-founds Bloomberg L.P. (formerly Innovative Market Systems) using a $10 million partnership buyout from Salomon Brothers.

1982 – Creates the Bloomberg terminal, a software system with a specialized keyboard used by financial professionals to trade stocks electronically and access live market data.

1990 – Co-founds Bloomberg News (formerly Bloomberg Business News).

1994 – Launches Bloomberg Television (formerly Bloomberg Information TV).

1996-2002 – Serves as chairman of the Johns Hopkins University’s board of trustees.

1997 – His memoir, “Bloomberg by Bloomberg,” is published.

November 6, 2001 – Is elected mayor of New York.

November 8, 2005 – Is elected to a second term.

November 3, 2009 – Is elected to a third term after spending more than $100 million on his reelection campaign. In October, the New York City Council voted to extend the city’s mayoral term limits from two four-year terms to three.

May 2012 – Announces a proposal to ban the sale of sugary drinks larger than 16 ounces at restaurants, food carts and any other establishments that receive letter grades for food service. On June 26, 2014, New York’s Court of Appeals rules that New York City’s ban on large sugary drinks, which was previously blocked by lower courts, is illegal.

July 27, 2016 – Endorses Hillary Clinton for president at the Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia.

March 2019 – Ranks No. 9 on Forbes’ annual list of billionaires, with a net worth of $55.5 billion.

November 24, 2019 - Announces his late-entry Democratic presidential bid, unveiling a campaign squarely aimed at defeating President Donald Trump.

November 24, 2019 – Bloomberg News Editor-in-Chief John Micklethwait releases a statement addressing how the network will cover the 2020 presidential campaign and reveals that it will not investigate Bloomberg or any other Democratic candidates.

February 10, 2020 – Audio is posted online of Bloomberg from 2015, defending his use of “stop and frisk” as mayor by describing the policy as a way to reduce violence by throwing minority kids “up against the walls and frisk[ing] them.” Bloomberg later says his 2015 comments about the controversial stop and frisk policing policy do not reflect the way he thinks or the way he led as mayor of New York City.

February 18, 2020 – Qualifies for his first Democratic presidential debate, by polling four times at or above 10% nationally.

February 18, 2020 – A campaign adviser tells CNN that Bloomberg would sell his financial information and media company if he’s elected president, in an effort to be “180 degrees away from where Donald Trump is on these issues.”

February 19, 2020 – Faces criticism in first presidential debate from other Democratic candidates regarding campaign spending, his record on policing tactics as mayor of New York and misogynistic comments he allegedly made about women at his company in the 1980s and 1990s.

March 4, 2020 – Ends his presidential campaign and endorses Joe Biden.

September 3, 2020 – Bloomberg’s charity, Bloomberg Philanthropies, announces he is donating $100 million to the nation’s four historically Black medical schools to help ease the student debt burden for the next generation of Black physicians.

September 25, 2020 – Bloomberg announces $40 million in TV ads supporting Biden statewide in Florida.