WASHINGTON — Vice President Joe Biden is reaching out to Democrats beyond his inner circle to assess his prospects in states that hold early contests for the party’s presidential nomination, according to two people familiar with his discussions.
The vice president’s calls are no guarantee he will run, the people said, but they indicate that he’s not cowed by Hillary Rodham Clinton’s strong performance in the first Democratic primary debate earlier this week.
The outreach, while focused on assessing his prospects in early primary and caucus states, goes beyond Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina, said the people, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the deliberations have been closely held.
In more than a dozen calls, Biden has been seeking out political operatives with detailed knowledge of the race and about organizing in individual states.
Biden already was making calls prior to the Democratic presidential debate on Tuesday night, but his engagement has increased since then, the people said.
In the debate, which Biden watched from home, Clinton gave a performance that was widely regarded as weakening Biden’s rationale for jumping into the race as an alternative to the former secretary of State. At the same time, Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders reinforced his appeal to the liberal base, which has responded with donations.
Clinton’s campaign chairman, John Podesta, said after the debate that time is running out for Biden.
“They will have a healthy, substantive debate if he decides to get in but as I said last night, I think it’s time for him to make that decision,” Podesta said on MSNBC Wednesday.
Biden has declined to answer questions about whether he’ll run and when he will decide. At a transportation roundtable at the White House on Wednesday, he said only that he was “proud” of his fellow Democrats for their debate performances.
Outside a meeting with Korean President Park Geun-hye on Thursday at his residence, Biden joked in response to shouted questions about whether he would declare himself a candidate, “I’ll tell you in Korean.” Eventually he shut down queries by saying, “I’m here to greet President Park; I’ll talk to you all about that later.”
Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.