Bill Clinton has said he would be “happy” if his wife Hillary ran for president in 2016, despite her insistence that she will bow out of politics next year.
“It’s entirely up to her,” Mr Clinton said. “I believe that she’s being absolutely honest with you when she says she doesn’t think she’ll go back into politics. But if she comes home and we do this foundation stuff for the rest of our lives, I’ll be happy. If she changes her mind and decides to run, I’ll be happy.”
His comments offer a glimmer of hope for supporters of the former first lady, who suggest she would be the best candidate to prevent a Republican claiming the presidency in 2016.
After her failed White House bid in 2008, Mrs. Clinton said she held out hope that there would be a female president in the future.
But earlier this year Mrs. Clinton insisted she would not run for president again, telling CNN she already had “the best job” as Secretary of State.
“This is a moment in history where it is almost hard to catch your breath,” she said. “There are both the tragedies and disasters that we have seen from Haiti to Japan and there are the extraordinary opportunities and challenges that we see right here in Egypt and the rest of the region.”
In January she said after 20 years on “the high wire of American politics” she had had enough.
Mr. Clinton also said he doubted that Mitt Romney could beat Barack Obama in the forthcoming election, after such a grueling candidacy battle.
“Mr Romney has a different challenge than I did. Even though he had a bruising primary and higher negatives and I did too. Mine was just one long character attack. It was a personal attack on me,” the former president said, adding that Mr Romney still needed to convince swing voters.
