DALLAS — Even at 38 degrees, several hundred supporters crowded onto the rooftop of a downtown restaurant where Democratic presidential candidate Mike Bloomberg hosted a campaign rally on Saturday night.
“I’m campaigning for the second hardest job in America – second only behind the new head coach for the Dallas Cowboys,” he joked with the crowd after arriving at The Happiest Hour in Uptown at about 7:30 p.m.
It was the final stop in his day long Texas tour which began in San Antonio, with stops in San Marcos, Austin and Waco.
The Dallas stop also comes several days after Bloomberg’s campaign released a jobs plan to improve the economy.
In a one-on-one interview with WFAA on his campaign bus, we asked Bloomberg where he sees weaknesses in the Texas economy, since unemployment is at 3.4%. That's below the national average.
“Not everybody shares [in it], no matter how good the economy is. And you want to make sure more people can share in it, and you want to make sure you don't kill the golden goose,” Bloomberg told WFAA.
Among his economic proposals is an increase in the minimum wage to $15 per hour.
When asked if he would lift tariffs imposed by President Trump, Bloomberg said he believes trade wars are bad.
But when asked if he would roll back the Republican tax cuts, Bloomberg said he did support the corporate tax cut, even though he said he thought it went too far. Still, he suggested that the wealthy, like him, are not paying enough in taxes.
Bloomberg, a businessman with a net worth reportedly at $57 billion dollars and the former mayor of New York City, is funding this presidential run with his own money.
But what will the race cost?
“I have absolutely no idea,” he told WFAA.
When pressed and asked how much he is prepared to spend, Bloomberg said he wasn't quite sure.
"I don't know the answer to that," he said. "But somebody said to me 'You're spending a lot of money,' and I said 'You know I'm trying to use this money to get rid of Donald Trump. You want me to spend more or less?'”
Bloomberg is also doing something no presidential candidate has ever done before. He’s skipping Iowa and the early voting states and instead concentrating on delegate-rich states like Texas.
Bloomberg said since he got in the presidential race late, he did not have an opportunity to establish viable ground operations in Iowa and New Hampshire.
Still, his campaign has organized fast. Bloomberg has run television ads in Texas for weeks now. In addition, the campaign said it already has more than 500 staff members working in 30 states.
On Saturday night, Bloomberg confirmed earlier reports to WFAA that he would keep campaign staff on the payroll even if he is not the Democratic nominee this year.
“We have probably a thousand people working across the country," he said. "We're not going to keep all of them. But in all of the big cities, we'll keep our campaign headquarters and a big chunk of the people through November 3rd to try to help,” Bloomberg told WFAA. “Having said that, I expect to be the candidate, so they're going to be working for me.”
Texas’ Democratic delegates will help determine Bloomberg’s political future in less than two months on Super Tuesday.
Click below to watch the entire interview with Bloomberg.