By Elizabeth Wasserman, Bloomberg News (TNS)
U.S. Vice President Joe Biden is leaving the door open to a possible 2016 White House bid.
Biden told ABC’s Good Morning America Wednesday that he sees the contest for the Democratic nomination for president as “wide open,” even though former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton — widely considered a front-runner — has yet to announce her candidacy.
“Yes, there is a chance,” Biden said in the interview. “But I haven’t made my mind up about that. We’ve got a lot of work to do between now and then. There’s plenty of time.”
Biden said he wouldn’t decide until summer about another bid for the presidency. He said Clinton is “really competent, capable person and a friend.”
“I think this is wide open on both sides,” Biden said in the interview a day after the president’s State of the Union address to Congress. “Right now my focus is getting implemented what the president talked about last night: to nail down this recovery and get the middle class back in the game.”
In 1988 and 2008, Biden unsuccessfully sought the Democratic presidential nod but dropped out both times. In the 2008 campaign, Barack Obama selected Biden to be the party’s vice presidential nominee. Both won re-election in 2012.
“The person who is going to be the next president of the United States,” Biden said in the interview, “is the one who is going to be able to articulate the clearest vision to the American people of where they’re going to take the country.”
Photo: Vice President Joe Biden, left, and Speaker of the House John Boehner wait for the start of the State of The Union address by President Barack Obama on January 20, 2015, in the House Chamber of the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C. (Mandel Ngan/AFP/Pool/TNS)
