Elizabeth Warren calls Mike Bloomberg 'egomaniac billionaire' on Twitter

Former New York mayor criticised by some fellow Democrats for trying to 'buy' nomination

Presidential hopeful Elizabeth Warren has described former New York mayor Mike Bloomberg as an “egomaniac billionaire”.

The senator from Massachusetts tweeted her disappointment that Mr Bloomberg was allowed to join the 19 February Democratic debate in Nevada.

“It’s a shame Mike Bloomberg can buy his way into the debate. But at least now primary voters curious about how each candidate will take on Donald Trump can get a live demonstration of how we each take on an egomaniac billionaire,” she wrote in a tweet.

Mr Bloomberg qualified for the Nevada debates despite not appearing on that state’s primary ballot.

Ms Warren – who has generally eschewed attacking other primary candidates directly – made unifying the party a central theme of her concession speech following the Iowa Caucus. She claimed she was the candidate who could “pull the party together”.

“I’m running a campaign that includes as many people as possible. And you know what? That’s a campaign that’s gonna win,” she said.”That’s how we’re going to beat Donald Trump in 2020.”

However, Mr Bloomberg’s recent polling – he came in second place in an NPR/PBS NewsHour/Marist poll, with 19 percent of the vote – has shown he’s growing in popularity with some voters. (It’s worth noting that despite his second place finish, Mr Bloomberg was still trounced by Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders, who won the poll handily with 31 per cent.)

The change in Ms Warren’s rhetoric – placing herself and the other Democratic candidates in opposition to Mr Bloomberg – may suggest that her striving to be the “unity candidate” may be put on the backburner while Mr Bloomberg is still in the race.

Ms Warren isn’t the first one to criticise Mr Bloomberg using his personal fortune to shove his way into the 2020 Democratic primary.

On Monday night in Tacoma, Washington, Mr Sanders spoke to a crowd of more than 17,000, telling them that Mr Bloomberg would not “buy the election”.

“Today we say to Mayor Bloomberg, we are a democracy, not an oligarchy. You are not going to buy this election,” Mr Sanders said.

Mr Bloomberg and Mr Sanders have been tilting at each other in the last few days.

On Monday, Mr Bloomberg’s campaign aired an ad taking aim at supporters of Mr Sanders, isolating and highlighting insulting social media posts from individuals the ad claims support the Vermont senator. Later, Mr Bloomberg’s campaign manager released a statement calling Mr Trump “Bernie’s new bro”.

In response, Mr Sanders’ campaign shared a photo of Mr Bloomberg – who only registered as a Democrat in 2018 – playing golf with President Donald Trump.