White House spokesman Josh Earnest still wasn’t ready on Tuesday to say President Obama is ready to endorse Hillary Clinton, a day after the Associated Press said Clinton has secured enough delegates to carry the Democratic nomination for president.
Obama is a Democratic superdelegate, one of the key Democratic officials who play a role in the nominating process akin to the Electoral College in the general election.
“However, at this point, there is at least one superdelegate, the one who works in the Oval Office, who is not prepared to make a public declaration about his endorsement at this point,” Earnest said as Democrats in California, New Jersey and a number of other states head to the polls.
“But stay tuned and we’ll keep you updated,” Earnest promised.
Last week Obama said, “I think we’ll probably have a pretty good sense next week of who the nominee will end up being.”
Obama is headlining two party fundraisers in New York on Wednesday, but Earnest said those fundraisers were planned weeks ago, and are separate from any travel Clinton may have planned.
“These fundraisers have been on the books for quite some time and I don’t believe most people expected that the Democratic nomination would continue to be contested in the first week of June,” Earnest said.
“I can tell you that the president does not expect to see or meet or appear with Secretary Clinton when he’s in New York tomorrow,” Earnest said. “He will be focused on a schedule that is focused on two fundraisers and a taping of the Tonight Show.”
