[Poppy Harlow, Cnn Anchor:] All right. Good morning. Good to be with you. I'm Poppy Harlow in New York. He is in. Former New York City mayor Mike Bloomberg qualifies for tomorrow's Democratic debate setting the stage for a tense battle with his Democratic rivals who say he's buying his way into this election. So far, Bloomberg has shelled out more than $400 million in ads. And this morning, a new poll appears to show that it's working. Look at this. OK. There you see Bernie Sanders on top surging to 31 percent support nationally. But Bloomberg has risen all the way to the second spot coming in at 19 percent of national support. These two already throwing jabs. So tomorrow could get feisty. Let's go to our Cristina Alesci who is following the Bloomberg campaign very closely along with Arlette Saenz. Arlette, break those numbers down for us. How significant is it to see him there?
[Arlette Saenz, Cnn Political Correspondent:] Well, Poppy, this new national poll isn't just showing us that Michael Bloomberg will be on the debate stage tomorrow but it's also showing major gains for both Michael Bloomberg and Bernie Sanders. And if you take a look at this same poll compared to when they released a poll in December, Bernie Sanders is up nine points, far and away leading the pack right now. Then he is followed by Michael Bloomberg who is up 15 points since this poll was conducted back in December. You're seeing Joe Biden in third place. He's dropped nine points. Elizabeth Warren has also dropped a little bit, and Mayor Pete Buttigieg has also dropped five points while Klobuchar has gained. So you're seeing quite a bit of movement within the Democratic field on the national scale right now. But then if you also take a look at head-to-head matchups between these Democratic contenders and President Trump. Right now Joe Biden is the one who is actually the furthest leading Trump in those head- to-head matchups. He's at 50 percent and Donald Trump at 44 percent. He's then followed by Michael Bloomberg which is at 48 percent, President Trump at 44 percent and Bernie Sanders, 48 versus 45 against President Trump. So this is all coming as the Democrats are preparing to take the stage. There will be six contenders. Michael Bloomberg being on that stage for the first time against his Democratic rivals where he could take quite a bit of incoming fire Poppy.
[Harlow:] Yes. I think that's a pretty sure bet, Arlette. Thank you so much. All right. Let's turn to Cristina Alesci. You've covered this campaign before it was a campaign very closely. He wasn't going to run and then he's running, and you've been on top of it all. Let's just start with his strategy. What do you know about Mayor Bloomberg's strategy going into his first debate tomorrow night?
[Cristina Alesci, Cnn Money And Politics Correspondent:] So the campaign is keeping this very close to the vest.
[Harlow:] Yes.
[Alesci:] But based on my reporting it looks like they're going to try and take a very strong hit at Bernie Sanders.
[Harlow:] OK.
[Alesci:] And we saw a preview of that yesterday when they released that ad really criticizing Bernie Sanders for not doing more to curb some of his supporters who use these aggressive tactics on social media. So they may try and make this case that Bernie Sanders is being divisive. But, listen, Michael Bloomberg has spent $400 million to get on that debate stage. Now he has to prove that he has what it takes to confront his opponents head on because if you go and I've been to the rallies. You go to the rallies. Michael Bloomberg is very scripted. He doesn't take questions from the audience. This is the first time
[Harlow:] Yes.
[Alesci:] that voters are going to see him interact and have to deal with information real time and take that fire and not hide behind the ads.
[Harlow:] And let's just OK, I've interviewed him before. He doesn't always love tough questions.
[Alesci:] Oh, boy.
[Harlow:] So, you know, it's going to be really interesting to see how he responds on the debate stage. You know this. Looking at the numbers, he has not made any ad spend, though, in Nevada, in South Carolina. He's been skipping those four first states.
[Alesci:] Exactly.
[Harlow:] How is he preparing for what will be hard questions from the moderators and from his opponents?
[Alesci:] You definitely know him well. He has very little tolerance for questions, especially from reporters. He's preparing by doing what candidates do which is mock debates. And, you know, one of his campaign one of his most senior advisers is playing Bernie Sanders. They're doing a lot of role playing. They intentionally kept his schedule light this week so that he can do that. He has one event after the debate in Utah. But they purposely kept his schedule pretty clean this week. But it's very clear that they want a three-way race or a three-way conversation. They want the conversation to be about Michael Bloomberg, Bernie Sanders and Donald Trump. In fact, his campaign, Bloomberg's campaign manager messaged me just before I got on set and he said the primary is now Bernie's to lose and Mike's to win. There's really no math for anyone else in the delegate race. So this is the story that they want to tell.
[Harlow:] OK. It will all play out on stage tomorrow night. Cristina, thank you very much. And Arlette, thank you. Let's talk more about this. Our panel is here. CNN political commentator and Democratic strategist Aisha Moody-Mills and Anna Palmer, senior Washington correspondent at Politico. Ladies, thank you so much for being with me. Aisha, let's talk about that and the expectations for Bloomberg come tomorrow night and the lack of practice as he takes the stage.
[Aisha Moodie-mills, Democratic Strategist:] Yes, I think that, you know, he probably should be doing a bit of debate prep right now because he is going to get hurled at with questions about stop and frisk for sure and his tenure around mayor and all the comments that just came out that he seemed to very fluidly say over the last five or six years about how he felt about, you know, race relations, how he felt about crime, and who the perpetrators were. And he's going to need to be prepared to take on his colleagues who are going to be attacking him around it, and answer some tough questions from the moderators as well. So this idea that he doesn't like to get into, you know, a tough debate or be able to isn't able to respond for himself, Well, that's going to all play out here. And it's really important when it comes down to this base of people who are going to be voting for him as well. He thinks he's siphoning off African-Americans. So he's going to need to be able to speak to us.
[Harlow:] It's been a few thoughts. It's been interesting to see his polling nationally among African-American voters surge in the last few weeks as Biden's has fallen. We'll see what that means state by state. But also, Anna, to Aisha's point about, you know, he doesn't like tough debates, I don't know that he doesn't like tough debates. I just I think the question is, as Politico put it in their piece, can he keep his cool when he gets asked those tough questions? Because I think any reporter who's interviewed him knows, you know you know, he'll often respond not exactly in the coolest manner if he doesn't like the question he's being asked.
[Anna Palmer, Senior Washington Correspondent, Politico:] Right. He can be pretty dismissive certainly. I think the question is going to be a lot of people are going to be tuning in. He has had the ability to flood the air waves and put out his message of what the candidate he wants to portray for America. The question is going to be, can he live up to that on the debate stage? I think it's going to he's going to face questions like Aisha was saying but also I think that he's going to be facing questions about potential sexism, things in the workplace that he's going to have to answer to that he regularly does not like to when he is pressed because he will be pressed. How does he respond? Do voters think that he is the guy who can go up and match up against Donald Trump or does he seem like a hothead or, you know, somebody who's out of touch billionaire who's just spending his own largess to try to get on the ballot?
[Harlow:] You know, talking about money, guys, Dana Bash did a fascinating interview with Jim Clyburn, obviously key when it comes to South Carolina, over the weekend. And she asked him about Tom Steyer, you know, polling in the double digits in Nevada and in South Carolina, and what money means in this race, right? And here was his answer.
[Rep. Jim Clyburn:] I've always said money is the mother's milk of politics. He has money. And he has been spending it. And so I think that will always make a difference. Where was Bloomberg nationally among voters a month ago? But he has money. He's been spending it, and he's changed the calculations a lot. So for us to just pretend that money doesn't make a difference, that would be foolhardy. Money makes a difference. Steyer has it. He's been spending it, and he's reaping the rewards.
[Harlow:] Aisha, money makes the difference. And up until tomorrow night, you know, the debate stage, it's going to be money that talks for Bloomberg in terms of the ads. But the debate is something different than that. And that's what Amy Klobuchar was calling for saying, I think I can beat him on the debate stage. Can the other candidates beat Bloomberg on the debate stage?
[Moodie-mills:] Well, one, I want to go back to this money thing. Yes, money matters in politics. It's very expensive to wield a national campaign to fly from state to state to state to connect with voters. But all money ain't good money, and that's really what this boils down to. Bernie Sanders has a ton of money. Elizabeth Warren is raising money. Pete Buttigieg is raising money, but is that money coming from people who are invested, dollar by dollar, in the message and the campaign? Because they feel compelled to participate? Because they believe in a vision of someone? Or are you just simply spending your own money as a vanity project to like market your way into name recognition?
[Harlow:] Well
[Moodie-mills:] Those things matter. And I think that when we talk about money, like that's really an important distinction.
[Harlow:] Yes.
[Moodie-mills:] And I think that that's going to play out ultimately on the ground. On the debate stage, sure. It's great that like he's bought the polling that Bloomberg has, you know, gotten his polling numbers together. But we can now see him be able to have a conversation with people because he's not actually out there talking to people. He's not doing town halls. He's not connecting with voters. And so I think that this debate stage is going to be really important because it matters that voters get to hear where candidates stand on the issues in their own words. And I do think that there are all the other people on the stage are practiced and prepared. They've been debating, they've been doing their town halls, they've been doing this for months. So it will be interesting to see how Bloomberg jumps into the fray.
[Harlow:] Anna, do you think that that might be writing off Bloomberg too quickly? Because, yes, he spent $400 million but Tom Steyer spent almost $200 million nationally and he's not even registering anywhere near the top in this new PBS-NewsHour poll. Is it something beyond the ad spend that's resonating with voters about Bloomberg?
[Palmer:] I mean, clearly his message, I do think, is actually resonating. I think a lot of that has to do with how poorly Joe Biden has done coming out of Iowa and New Hampshire and certainly when I talk to establishment Democrats, operatives and people in Washington, they are very nervous, and they are starting to coalesce around Mike Bloomberg as the answer, the antidote as they see it to a Bernie Sanders nomination. And so I think he has the money. I think we are going to see he's going to be put to the test. How does he hold up on the debate stage? We also see them kind of tempering expectations. He hasn't maybe been speaking to voters. He hasn't been on the stage before. Others are more tested. So I think as long as he doesn't have a massive flop tomorrow, it's probably a win for the Bloomberg camp because listen, we're all talking about him all day long, today, tomorrow, and the following day.
[Harlow:] Well, when you have a surge like that, you get the headlines, for sure.
[Palmer:] Right.
[Harlow:] Thanks so much, Anna Palmer, Aisha Moodie-Mills. Appreciate it. We'll see what the debate brings. Join CNN for a series of live town halls with several of the top 2020 Democrats. It is in Las Vegas ahead of this week's Nevada caucus. The two-night event starts tonight and continues on Thursday, 8:00 Eastern, only right here on CNN. Still to come, members of a group of more than 1,000 federal judges calling for an emergency meeting. Why they say the Justice Department is in crisis. And this cannot wait. Also, 13 coronavirus patients being treated in Omaha this morning. We'll give you a live update on their condition ahead. And the deadly virus is having a major impact on China's economy. We'll talk to the president's top trade adviser Peter Navarro about what the fallout could be here in the United States, next.