Bill de Blasio drops out of 2020 race

New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio is finally calling it quits.

The 2020 Democrat announced Friday he's ending his campaign for president, saying in an interview on MSNBC's Morning Joe, "It's clearly not my time."

De Blasio entered the 2020 Democratic presidential race in May but didn't qualify for the third Democratic debate in September due to his low polling; he was unable to reach two percent support in four qualifying polls and 130,000 individual donors. His polling hadn't much improved since then, and he was generally earning either zero or one percent support.

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up

De Blasio cited this as his reason for not remaining in the race, saying he was not "going to be able to meet" the "high bar" required to get back into the debates. He declined to endorse another candidate but said he will support the eventual Democratic nominee.

Now, de Blasio can focus full time on New York City, where a recent poll found his presidential bid earned zero percent support. Brendan Morrow