Former New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg said he would have sought the White House with Vice President Joe Biden if the two men could have decided whom to place on top of the ticket.
“We actually talked about doing a joint ticket; but we couldn’t agree on whether it was reverse or straight alphabetical order,” Bloomberg joked Tuesday before introducing Biden at an event highlighting the Obama administration’s cancer “moonshot” initiative.
Bloomberg said that Biden’s son, Beau, who died of brain cancer last year, is surely proud that “your last big crusade in public office, unless you’re going to tell me something that we don’t know,” is his quest to help find a cure for cancer, Bloomberg began the joke.
Last fall when Biden declined to seek the Democratic nomination, the White House revealed his decision by pairing it with the cancer initiative’s unveiling.
Biden’s work on the project “might be most powerful and important legacy for all your public service,” Bloomberg told Biden as the two appeared at Johns Hopkins University to showcase Bloomberg’s major donation to the school’s new cancer research initiative.
Bloomberg also opted against a run for the presidency in favor of continuing his philanthropic work, including his extensive donations to fighting cancer.
