President Barack Obama urged his former-Vice President Joe Biden not to run against Hillary Clinton in 2016.
According to a report from the New York Times, Obama had concluded that Clinton had the best chance of winning and did not want Biden to interfere.
“Barack Obama did not think Joseph R. Biden Jr. should run for president — he hardly needed to say it out loud for aides to understand that. The trick that summer of 2015 was finding a way to nudge Mr. Biden to stay out of the race without looking as if he was nudging Mr. Biden to stay out of the race,” the Times article began.
Obama, instead of speaking to Biden personally, ultimately had a strategist tell Biden he shouldn’t bother.
“The president was not encouraging,” Biden said, according to the Times.
Biden claims that now Obama isn’t endorsing him because he asked him not to.
Speaking to reporters at an Amtrak Station in Delaware, Biden said “I asked President Obama not to endorse me. He doesn’t want to — whoever wins this nomination should win it on their own merits. Welcome to Delaware.”
