Webb remains undecided about presidential endorsement

By Jay Warren
WSLS10 Anchor
Published: February 21, 2008

While politicians across the country are falling over themselves to endorse one of the presidential candidates, one Virginia politician seems quite content to sit on the sidelines.

Senator Jim Webb told me today that he isn’t ready to endorse either Sens. Clinton or Obama. Leading up to Virginia’s primary, Webb had consistently said that he would not endorse anyone before the primary. Well Virginians voted Tuesday of last week (in record numbers) and many of us expected that Sen. Webb would now be ready to announce his endorsement, presumably the winner of Virginia’s primary. Well, think again.

In fact, Webb said today that he isn’t sure his endorsement and vote as a super delegate will go to the Virginia winner: Sen. Obama.

Warren: “A lot of people are saying a super delegate should vote like their state voted. In this case it was overwhelmingly for Obama. Do you agree with that philosophy that if your state voted that way you should vote that way?”

Webb: “Not necessarily. I’m not saying that I’m not going to support Barack. I like Barack. I like Hillary Clinton both. But, I think the super delegate process was put in place to put a measure of judgment among those delegates. I have five or six months to figure all that out.”

Coincidentally, Webb was visiting the 9th Congressional District this morning. That’s the only district in the commonwealth that went for Sen. Clinton and it went for her by a 30 point margin.

So, the guessing game continues. When and who Sen. Webb will endorse someone? The one thing we know for sure: Webb will campaign vigorously for the eventual nominee. He made that clear today.