Democratic presidential candidate and former New York City mayor Mike Bloomberg talks to supporters at a rally on February 20, 2020 in Salt Lake City, Utah. Image by George Frey/Getty Images

By Aiden Pink February 24, 2020

Former New York City Mayor Mike Bloomberg’s Chicago campaign office was vandalized with the words “racist,” sexist,” “GOP” and “oligarch” on Sunday, an act that Bloomberg’s campaign manager blamed on rival Sen. Bernie Sanders’ “willingness to condone and promote Trump-like rhetoric.”

Several Bloomberg campaign offices around the country have been defaced in the last month, according to the campaign, with multiple instances of defacement using the word “oligarch.” While no suspects have been arrested in these cases, Bloomberg campaign manager Kevin Sheekey said that Sanders and the senator’s supporters had frequently used the word to describe the billionaire businessman and former New York mayor.

Sheekey previously made such claims after a similar “oligarch” vandalism incident in Knoxville, Tennessee last week; the Sanders campaign declined to comment to Reuters about that event.

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The Merriam-Webster dictionary defines “oligarch” as a supporter of an oligarchy, which means “government by the few.”

Aiden Pink is the deputy news editor of the Forward. Contact him at [email protected] or follow him on Twitter @aidenpink

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