The billionaire former New York mayor had surged in the polls on the back of lavish spending on ads – then came his moment onstage in Las Vegas and a rapid revision of his prospects

After spending nearly half a billion dollars on advertising that portrays him as a pioneering leader, a man who would be a unifying, inspirational presence in the White House, Michael Bloomberg finally got the chance this week to sell himself, live, to a nationwide audience.

It didn’t go well. Instead of Wednesday’s Democratic debate showing Bloomberg to be a master statesman, the billionaire former New York City mayor crumpled in the face of an onslaught from his rivals. He came across, at turns, as angry, bewildered and contemptuous as he was taken to task over his troubling record on race and gender rights.

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One post-debate poll showed Bloomberg’s favorability down a startling 20 points among likely Democratic primary voters.

With Bloomberg’s hopes of becoming president now pinned on an-all-or-nothing vote in a flood of states on Super Tuesday in just over a week’s time, some are now wondering whether his hapless showing might have blown his chance altogether.

“He can certainly remain in the game and spend his millions of dollars on ad buys criticizing Trump, which may not be such a bad thing for the Democratic party, but I don’t see him coming back. I just don’t,” said Robin Andersen, a professor of communication and media studies at Fordham University in New York.

“Just visually, maybe a billionaire doesn’t have what’s needed in a campaign to be able to field answers and not look like you are hating life, or that you’re bored or that you’re getting grumpy. Bloomberg didn’t seem to realize that even if you’re not speaking, the camera is on you.”

Bloomberg, who made his $64bn fortune through his eponymous financial services company, had glided through his presidential campaign largely unimpeded until Wednesday.

While other leading candidates, including the current frontrunner Bernie Sanders, spent the summer and autumn of 2019 engaged in bruising debates and town halls, Bloomberg only entered the race in November, avoiding scrutiny and remaining above the fray.

He dodged much of the legwork of campaigning too. Bloomberg shunned Iowa and New Hampshire, two states where a candidate traditionally must woo voters to have a shot at the presidency, instead splashing vast amounts of cash on TV ads and a gigantic social media campaign.

Those highly polished commercials have been unavoidable for people across America for the past two months. In them, Bloomberg is shown alongside Barack Obama, still the most popular Democratic politician in the country, or criticizing Trump with a combination of humor and vitriol.

Bloomberg has spent a fortune hiring some of the best political operatives in the country, and it shows. In a remarkably short space of time, Bloomberg has rocketed to third or even second place in national polls. He also leads in some key states, such as Florida and Oklahoma.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Mike Bloomberg signs a photo for a fan after a campaign rally in Salt Lake City, Utah, on Thursday. Photograph: Ed Kosmicki/Reuters

Yet all that money can’t protect Bloomberg from his controversial words and deeds during a long career in business and 12 years as New York’s mayor. The debate, held in Las Vegas, proved that, as Bloomberg was immediately lambasted by Elizabeth Warren, the left-leaning Massachusetts senator.

“I’d like to talk about who we’re running against – a billionaire who calls women ‘fat broads’ and ‘horse-faced lesbians’,” Warren said. “And no, I’m not talking about Donald Trump. I’m talking about Michael Bloomberg.”

For many of the watching 19.3 million people – a record for a Democratic primary debate – this was probably their first introduction to Bloomberg, and it wasn’t a good start. It didn’t get any better. The next two hours saw Bloomberg’s five co-debaters tear into him again and again.

His tenure as mayor was repeatedly brought into question. Bloomberg oversaw a huge increase in stop-and-frisk policing, a practice that disproportionately targeted African Americans and Latinos, people who make up a key Democratic constituency. Allegations of sexual harassment and discrimination at his Blooomberg financial information and news company were brought up, and Warren, in particular, criticized the non-disclosure agreements the company struck with former employees, preventing them from speaking publicly.

Bloomberg is said to have prepared for the debate, but struggled to defend himself against aspects of his record that were ripe for attack.

“In some instances [Bloomberg was] sort of halting, and stumbling to deliver a response to attacks that had been telegraphed, previewed on the stump by several of these candidates,” said Mitchell McKinney, professor of political communication at the University of Missouri.

“We are going to now see the [debate] image of Michael Bloomberg, his performance and compare that to his ad messages that are just saturating airwaves of a very resolute decision maker, a strong leader and also presidential.”

McKinney went on: “The Michael Bloomberg we saw on Wednesday is very different from that designed and controlled image and message. The question then is will he be able to survive with his ad messages and then somehow stumble through.”

Given not every voter will have been watching the debate, which finished at 11pm on the east coast, it raises the question of how much Bloomberg’s limp performance will matter. McKinney said the “pass-along effect’’ is important, however – the way that key clips from the debate will be disseminated through news channels and social media.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Bloomberg has poured millions into advertising, including this billboard on the Las Vegas Strip in Nevada. Photograph: Mark Ralston/AFP via Getty Images

Bloomberg’s slick team is already fighting that, however. In the hours after the debate, his campaign released its own, highly edited version of what happened in the debate, an alternate universe cut where Bloomberg flummoxed his rivals by pointing out none of them had started a business.

That video was pushed out on Facebook on Thursday, a platform where Bloomberg has already spent $45m on advertising – dwarfing even Trump, who has made Facebook reach a cornerstone of his campaign. The pass-along effect could ultimately mean people are being handed Bloomberg’s bilge rather than seeing him humiliated on stage.

The make-or-break date for Bloomberg is Tuesday 3 March, when voters in 14 states go to the polls in a defining primary contest. Fail then, and the prospect of President Bloomberg becomes extremely unlikely.

That apparently doesn’t bother him; he has suggested he’s in the race for the long haul. That isn’t good news for former vice-president Joe Biden, former South Bend mayor Pete Buttigieg, Senator Amy Klobuchar and fellow billionaire Tom Steyer, who make up a quintet of major candidates scrapping for the centrist lane of their party.

Together, this group’s supporters account for more than half of Democratic voters, but Bloomberg’s extravagant spending has pulled voters away from each of his rivals, leaving all five weakened and a long way from the lead.

The beneficiary of this has been none other than than the socialist Bernie Sanders, with his diehard supporters helping him to a double-digit lead over the centrists.

Ultimately, the impact of Bloomberg’s flashy ads and hundreds of millions of dollars could be the election of the most progressive, resolutely anti-wealth candidate of them all.