Former US President Bill Clinton administered the oath of office on a Bible once used by Franklin Delano Roosevelt. The formal midday service was held hours after De Blasio officially took office just after midnight on 1 January in a small ceremony at his home in Brooklyn. He succeeds Michael Bloomberg, who led the city in the aftermath of the attacks of 11 September 2001 and the recession six years later, and whose policies have been credited with making the city safer, greener and more livable. De Blasio presented himself as an anti-Bloomberg candidate, decrying the economic inequality that he said has emerged as New York shed its reputation from the 1970s and 1980s as a gritty and dangerous place.