White House spokesman Josh Earnest on Wednesday declined to say whether President Obama believes former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is “better prepared” than Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., to become the next president.
“The president hasn’t made public an assessment like that at this point,” Earnest said.
Obama said last week that Clinton was better prepared than any vice president to lead the country. But when Earnest was reminded of that, he still declined to say Clinton is “better prepared.”
“I think that was a clear acknowledgement of the skills and experience that she brings to the job,” Earnest said of Obama’s remarks.
Earnest’s remarks show the extent to which the White House is trying to say out of the Democratic primary. Earnest said Obama will continue to butt out.
“The president has also been clear that, at this point, he doesn’t plan to offer up a specific endorsement,” Earnest said just moments after Obama met with Sanders at the White House. Still, he said he “wouldn’t rule out” that Obama may make an endorsement at some point.
Obama will cast a ballot in Illinois’ Democratic presidential primary March 15, but Earnest would not commit to revealing whom he intends to pull the lever for, either beforehand or after.
“It’s good for the Democratic Party for there to be such a robust debate going on about who should be our party’s nominee,” Earnest said about Obama’s view of what is essentially a two-person race. “That debate is good for our democracy. It’s also good for the party … And while Senator Sanders noted the president is doing his best to allow the candidates to make their own case in the Democratic Party primary process, he expects to be very actively and personally engaged in the general election to support those candidates that actually are interested in building on the progress that this country has made in the seven years of his presidency.”
“That ability to engage Democrats and excite them and inspire them will be critical to the success of Democrats up and down the ballot,” regardless of who wins the nomination, Earnest said.
After meeting with Obama, Sanders said he doesn’t feel like Obama is rigging the race for front-runner Hillary Clinton.
“I think he and the vice president have tried to be fair and even-handed in the process, and I expect they will continue to be that way,” Sanders said.
Earnest said that praise Obama offered about Clinton, his former secretary of State and 2008 primary rival, in a recent interview was just that — praise for someone he admires, not an endorsement.
“The president also had the opportunity to watch her up close as she campaigned for the presidency in 2007 and in 2008, and he came away from that experience with a deep admiration of her skills as a political candidate,” Earnest explained.
“And the president has made no secret of the fact that over the years of campaigning against one another and then working together in the administration, that the two have become genuine friends,” Earnest said.
Earnest explained that Obama’s admiration for Clinton stems from the long slog they went through in 2008 when the nominating contest went on much longer than it had in decades.
“It’s a rather unique thing for two people to have participated in such a historic presidential election,” Earnest said. “It involved campaigning in states that had not recently been…actively contested… and they went through that contest together. It was a searing experience for him personally and…an experience that they…shared.”
That historic experience, however, is also a driving reason behind his unwillingness to endorse his friend, Clinton, at this stage, Earnest said.
“[T]he president also believes that it’s important that he himself benefited from a vigorous primary campaign…and if the primary process had been wrapped up in late January or early February, the president would not have had the benefit of honing the skills both on the stump and on the debate stage,” Earnest said.
