“Why not?” said one senior Trump campaign official, when asked if it was wise to go after Bloomberg for things that could easily boomerang onto the president. “It ends up being a [net] positive for us.” Another person familiar with Team Trump’s internal deliberations on this matter added that the former New York City mayor’s “baggage” on this would also likely be great for depressing Democratic turnout, particularly with young voters, should Bloomberg win the nomination…

While officials on Team Trump say they never expected Bloomberg to perform well on the debate stage, and are waiting to see, for instance, if Wednesday night has an effect on his poll numbers before completely writing him off as a possible general-election rival, others are giddy about the prospect of running against him. Among the beliefs they share is that the opposition-research file on Bloomberg could be potentially the thickest of anyone’s in the 2020 Democratic field, according to two sources familiar with the situation…

That Trump’s aides would simply breeze past his own history in attacking an opponent on these fronts represents yet another case study in the degree to which the president operates openly in bad faith and has determined that charges of political hypocrisy simply don’t matter for much of the electorate in modern politics.