substance. and nobody can say what is it like to have dealt with world leaders like vladimir putin or benjamin netanyahu, and she has the experience and the expertise and the intellect that make her an incredible leader and voice and will make her a great president. >> and she has a chance to show it again next week on the debate page. than you, nan hayworth, and any time she wants to come on here, and you as well. thank you for watching, everybody. >> "legal view with ashleigh banfield" starts right now. >> instead of campaign speeches tomorrow, she is going to be under oath answering questions about benghazi and could this be hillary clinton's make or break moment? and also, he was on the way home from church when his car

broke down from i-95 and soon after a plains clothed policemen drew his gun and corey james was dead. >> and also, randolphf holder in new yo new york city, the fourth policeman is killed in the line of duty in less than a year. i'm ashleigh banfield and welcome to legal view. will he or won't he? is he in or out? and america wants to know and we are not talking about joe biden, but we are now talk paul ryan, and paul ryan is not saying. paul ryan, yes, and joe biden, no. he is not the only politician keeping everybody guessing on the plans of the higher office, and instead, this wisconsin congressman and very reluck tant candidate for speaker of the house has now put the onus on his fellow republicans, touche, declaring he is going to stand for election as long as a few major conditions can be met, and

they are this. he says that every house republican has to support him, moderates all of the way to the ultraconservatives, and he says that he wants to make it much harder to bring a so-called vacate the chair motion which is a sort of the no-confidence vote which threatened to oust john boehner and still having young kids at work, and he says, i am not going to be working, and traveling and fund-raising everyday as a modern house speaker is obliged to do, and i want some work/life balance here. and speaking of the speaker john boehner, he said, we need a day to vote for the replacement which is october 29th, one week from tomorrow, and get the popcorn, because the republican s are going to vote amongst themselves the day before.

and now, a new cnn poll shows that 21% of americans approve of what the republican leaders in congress have done this year, and 74% disapprove. that is some breaking news that i want to bring to you at 12:10 about eight minutes from now, we are now learning that the vice president joe biden plans to make an announcement. how is that that only 2 1/2 show, i opened up the show by saying he is not the only politician to keep a secret right now, but turns out in about 7 minutes that is no longer a secret, so we will get the details of the wheres and the whens and the no without question the whats as to what joe biden plans the do. i want to bring in our senior guy on all things joe biden and above and that is wolf blitzer who is going to be joining me live from washington. why is it that out of the blue, out of the blue within seconds we find out there is going to be an announcement, and isn't there more planning and rollout? >> well, a lot of speculation

for weeks if not months whether the vice president will decide to run for president of the united states, and there is a lot of speculation that he would do it within the next few days. so presumably, he is going to let us know whether he is going in or staying out. that's what all of us have been waiting for. there is a lot of speculation over the past several days, that it is as early as next week, and yesterday we were speculating that he might want to make the announcement in or out before hillary clinton testifies before the select committee on benghazi tomorrow. to tai is the day, and the next few minutes we will learn whether or not he decides to stay out of the race for now or to jump into the race. given the fact that he wants to make the statement inside of the rose garden, gives it a certain indication that he is not going to be getting into the race, because he wouldn't want to necessarily do a political statement inside of the white house, but that is all pure speculation right now, and we are just waiting to see what he decides, and we will know soon enough. >> can i ask you off of the top of your head, what else might he

need to hold a news conference for say within 24 hours of the benghazi hearings starting? what else could be so news w worthy that the vice president would hold an announcement in the rose garden? >> the fact that dr. jill bide zen at the white house, and we saw her arrive a while ago and one of the close friends senator ted kauffman is there over at the rose garden and he arrived a moment ago and this is the moment that he is going to be making the decision. i don't know what else he might well want to do with a are previously unscheduled announ announcemeannounc announcement at the rose garden. and wh he is going to run or not run. and that is the word of the hastily organized e sent. it is not something that he planned on doing for a long time like the appearance at george washington university where he was honoring the former vice president walter mdale at the event. it is something that has been announced literally moments ago and so presumably he has made up

the mind, and he is going to let us know. >> and the best kept secret, when you are planning these think kinds of thing, and ooet her se incredible of keeping flus the dark about it or what you said just rings true, it was hastily organized, although i hardly see it easy at a place like the white house. >> it was not necessarily hastily organized, but quick ly announced and now all of the sudden, reare porters have gathered the media there, and the cameras are there and he is going to walk out the make the statement. i assume a statement on whether or not he is going to run, but we will see. i mean, he has been under enormous pressure, ashleigh, to let the american people know what he is going to do. it has been a lot of stress on him, on his family, and they have gone through a lot over to the last several months, and mourning the loss of their son beau biden, the attorney general of delaware, and great son and servant and iraq war veteran and the family has suffered through the entire period. they needed some time to heal

understandably so, but presumably he has made up his mind and letting us know. and now a lot of people are saying, vice president biden, tell us, are you in or out, and a lot is at stake in the democratic party and the race for the democratic presidential nomination and the country as a whole. >> i don't want to suggest for a minute that a hastily organized news conference in the rose garden means he is going to announce that he is running, but for a candidate who has known for a while that he is going to run, hold as big conference to say, i am not running, and could it be that message? >> it could be in fact that e is is going to tell us that he is not run org could be thning or running. we have heard back and forth to associate, and people who have spoken to him over the past few days, and emerged from the conversations that he is going to run, and others saying that he is still on the fence.

so it is a very personal decision that he has to make together with his wife jill biden, so, you know, it is obvious hly a very, very tough decision. brianna keilar is with us, and you are getting more information? >> yes, we are waiting to hear what the vice president is going to say, but to the point that you just said whether we are aware of what he is going to say, his key and those close to him, and his closest confidants and friends are playing it close to the vest. those close to the circle have been reading the tea leaves and reading what the sort of the tone of what the vice president has been saying, and a lot of them believe he is going to get into the race. many other observers have is been looking at the things that he has been saying in recent days, and taking that as an indication that he may get into the race. for instance the last couple of days, he has really drawn a contrast with hillary clinton on everything from the decision to go in and get osama bin laden

and even a relationship with the republicans. and you know, wolf, hillary clinton described the republicans as one of her political enemies at the debate last week, and very pointed multiple times the vice president said that the republicans are not his enemy, and he even sort of seemed to ding hillary clinton on the number of miles she traveled as secretary of state, and he described the number he had traveled with which is more than she did. so a lot of people are wondering why he would have done that if this is not getting into the race, but at this point, it is impossible to know up till we see the vice president come out in the rose garden and tell us what he has decided. >> it is interesting when you think about it. it is one of the historic moments that we will find out whether or not hillary clinton, bernie sanders and martin o'malley will have another major challenger in the race for the democratic presidential nomination or whether or not the

vice president has decided, you know, i took a close look at it, and i looked at all of the considerations, the family considerations, and all of the political considerations, and would i have a chance. remember, he has run for president of the united states twice already, and he didn't do so well either time including eight years ago when he was running for the democratic presidential nomination, and spent more than 30 years in the united states senate, and now seven years as the the vice president of the united states. i know from my conversations, brianna, and you know from your conversations, he always felt that maybe it was the last chance. he is 72 years old, and maybe this is the last chance the seek the presidency, and if he didn't do it now sh, he might always regret that moment where he had that shot, and there's also all of the reports, briana, that over the past few months just before his son beau biden passed away that his son suggested to him to run for the president of the united states.

i think that jim acosta is with frus are the white house, and jim, what are you hearing over there? >> well, i do believe that the vice president is going to be coming out in a few minutes to announce his intentions of whether or not he is going to run for president in 2016. just to paint the picture here, wolf, and i don't need to paint it, but you can see it behind me, some of the vice president's closest advisers are ga sdether here, political advisers, and other adviser fras the vice president office and spokesperson kendra barkov here, and i asked her what the vice president is going to say, and she said, you have to wait to find out. and to add to the drama, the president is going to be coming out to make this statement in a few moments. we were tipped off within the last half hour that something big was about to take place when we saw ted kauffman coming in, and he has been having meetings with the vice president for weeks to go through the deliberative process of deciding whether or not biden will get into the race.

we saw dr. jill biden, the president's wife, and the vice president's wife go into the west wing, and dr. biden, and it is almost certain she is going to be walking out here, and in a few moments as well. but to give you a sense of how big of a deal this is at the white house, the white house gave no indication how it was happening. i was coming out of the pen and paper session with the environmental adviser, and i happened to take a peek to the rose garden and started to ask ed the sources, what is going on here, and within minutes, e we were getting the e-mails with the announcements, come out to the rose garden, because the vice president is going to make a statement. and this is extremely unusual to see joe biden the vice president come out here in a moment's notice like this, and wolf to, add to what i am seeing here sh, we are also seeing denis mcdonough, the chief of staff, and susan rice the senior advisers of the

administration have raced out here to the rose garden as well as the news media here to establish the live shots in a moment's notice, because we know what ever is going to be taking place, it is a big deal, and that is after weeks and weeks and weeks of hearing from joe biden what his intentions are. as you have noted this is a difficult and painful process for vice president biden and his family and grieving the loss of his son beau biden and all throughout the process, we have heard that this is going to be taking time. and the vice president, it was thought going to be decided by the end of the summer and now october, and now with the looming dates on the calendar, very, very important to presidential candidates, with refinally going to be hearing a final answer from the vice president, wolf. >> the fact that the president of the united states going to be walking into the rose garden with the vice president, it

would suggest presumably, jim acosta, that the vice president had decided maybe not to run for president, because the president is not going to be involved in a battle among democrats between hillary clinton and joe biden from the white house. the fact that he is making the statement in the rose garden as i said a few moments ago would indicate it is not going to be necessarily a jump into the race, because you don't want to do politics from the rose garden of the white house, and this is almost sacred ground if you will. and so the assumption is, at least the assumption as a former white house correspondent that i would make is that maybe he has decided to run for now, and he could always change his mind in the months the come, but the fact that he is doing it in the rose garden with the president who does want to get involved with the partisan politics with the democrats right now would seem to indicate that the vice president has decided maybe that is not a good time for him to jump into the race. >> that is right, wolf. i want to mention that e we received the two-minute warning.

a few moments ago i did see some words flashing on the screen and the vice president is going to be using some tell prompter and prepared text that he has been preparing some comments to make out here and talking about the deliberative process. just to go back to what you are saying, that is right, presidents conduct rose garden campaigns not vice presidents. and so for the vice president to come out here to the rose garden to announce he is running for president would be very, very highly unusual. >> and hold on, because the president and the vice president are about to walk into the rose garden, and dana bash is getting news up there on capitol hill? >> that the vice president did make some calls to the key players on capitol hill here to today and those people are keeping the cards close to the vest, it is certainly does seem that he is leaning more toward not running. not running. that was sort of the vibe that the key players here on capitol hill were getting for lots of

reasons and not the least of which is what you and jim were talking about. it is very unusual for a vice president to the announce in the rose garden and not the mention that all of those players and never mind the president, himself, the players from the administration who have split loyalties on the democratic primary policies would have be sitting here in the rose garden. and if so, you would know it is hard for all of the senior obama decisions to endorse him in a split decision like that. >> and it would be awkward to announce that he is running for president in the rose garden with the president there and all of the top security officials there, and normally when you make an announcement that you are going if be going out to some event or rally or do it in a different way, and so it would be awkward if he made an announcement there, and it could put the president in an awkward position, too, and the president is not going to necessarily endorse the vice president to succeed him or hillary clinton his former secretary of state to

succeed him, and he is going to be staying out of it for the time being and he'll want a democrat to replace him, but not to be directly involved. >> exactly. >> the indications are that the vice president at least for now is going to the say that not the time. and here he comes with dr. jill biden and the president, and so we will listen in. >> please, please, sit down. >> mr. president, thank you for lending me the rose garden for a moment. >> it is a nice place. >> and as the family and i have worked through the grieving process, i have said all along and time again what i have said to others that the process by the time we get through it, closes the window on mounting a realistic campaign for president. that it might close. i have concluded it has closed.

i know from previous experience that there's no timetable for this process. the process doesn't respect or much care about things like filing deadlines or debates and primaries and caucuses. but i also know that i couldn't do this if the family wasn't ready. the good news is that the family has reached that the point, but as i have said many times, my family has suffered loss, and i hope there is going to p come a time and i have said it to many families that sooner rather than later when you think of your loved one, it brings a smile to your lips before it brings a tear to your eyes. well, that is where the bidens are today. thank god. beau is our inspiration. unfortunately, i believe we're

out of time, the time necessary to mount a winning campaign for the nomination. while i am not going to be a candidate, i will speak out clearly and forcefully as to where we stand as a party and where we need to go as a nation. this is what i believe. i believe that president obama has led this nation from crisis to recovery, and we are now on the cusp of resurgence. i'm proud to have played a part in that. this party, our nation will be making a tragic mistake if we walk away or attempt to un-do the obama legacy. the american people have worked too hard, and we have have come too far for that. democrats should not only defend

and protect this record, but they should run on the record. we have a lot of work to get done over to the next 15 months, and there is a lot of what the president has to get done, but let me be clear, that we will be building on a really solid foundation. but it all starts with giving the middle-class a fighting chance. i know that you have in the press love to call me "middle-class joe" and in washington that is not a compliment and it means that you are not that sophisticated, but it is about the middle-class. it is not just a matter of fairness or economic growth, it is a matter of social stability for this nation. we cannot sustain the current levels of inequality that exist in this country. the huge sums of unlimit and

often secret money pouring into the politics is a fundamental threat to the democracy, and i really mean it. i think it is a fundamental threat, because the middle-class will never have a fighting chance in this country as long as just several hundred families, the wealthiest families control the process. it is just that simple. i believe that we have to level the playing field for the american people. that is going to take access to education and opportunity to work. we need to commit. we are fighting for 14 years, and we need to commit to 16 years of free public education for all of our children. we all know that 12 years of b public education is not enough. as a nation, let's make the same commitment to a college education that we made to the high school education 100 years ago. children and child care is the one biggest barrier for working

families. we need as the president proposed a triple child care tax credit and that alone will lead to dramatic increase in the number of women able to be in the workforce and will raise our economic standards. there are many equitable ways to pay for it, and how do you pay for this? there are many equitable ways to pay for it, and we can pay for all of this with one simple step by limiting the deductions in the tax code to 28% of income. wealthy folks will end up paying more, but it is my guess, and i mean it sincerely, it is my guess they are happen pu to build a stronger economy and better educated america. we need to lead more by the power of our example as the president has than merely by the exampleple pple of our power. we have learned many hard lessons of the large scale open-ended military invasions.

we have to accept the fact that we can't solve all of the world's problems. we can't solve many of them alone. the argument that we just have to do something when bad people do bad things isn't good enough. it is not a good enough reason for american intervention and to put our sons and daughters' lives on the line, put them at risk. i believe that we have to end the divisive partisan politics that is ripping this country apart. and we need to. and it is mean-spirited and petty and it has gone on for much too long. i don't believe like some do that it is naive to talk to republicans. i don't think that we should look at republicans as our enemies. they are opposition. they are not our enemies. and for the sake of the country, we have to work together.

as the president has said many times, compromise is not a dirty word. but how does this country function without consensus, and how do we move forward without being able to arrive at consensus, and four more years of this pitch battle may be more than this country can take. we have to change it. we have to change it. i believe that we need a moon shot in this country to cure cancer. it is personal. i know we can do this. the president and i have been working hard on increasing fund ing for research and development, because there are so many breakthroughs just on the horizon in science and medicine. the things that are just about to happen. and we can make them real with the absolute national commitment to end cancer as we know it today. i'm going to spend the next 15 months in this office pushing as

hard as i can to accomplish this. because i know there are democrats and republicans on the hill who share our passion, our passion to silence this deadly disease. if i can be be anything, i would have wanted to have been the president that ended cancer, because it is possible. i also believe we have to move in the arc of justice, and lgbt rights and are reform, and protecting women are from violence and rooting out institutional racism, at the core every one of these things, every one of these things is about the same thing. it is about equality, fairness and respect. and as my dad used to say, it is about affording every single person dignity. it is not complicated.

ev every single one of the issues is about dignity and the ugly forces of division won't let up, but they do not represent the american people. they do not represent the heart of this country. they represent a small fraction of the political elite, and the next president is going to have to take it on. most of all i believe that there is unlimited possibilities for the kun tcountry. i don't know how many of the white house staff and personnel have heard me say repeatedly that we are so much better positioned than any other kunfully the world. we are so -- i have been doing this for a long time. when i was elected as a 29-year-old kid, i was called the optimist. and i'm more optimistic about the possibilities to leap forward than at any time in my career.

i believed in my core that there is no country on the face of the earth better positioned to lead the world in the 21st century, but washington though has to function again and instead of being the problem, it has to be the part of the solution again. we have to be one america again. at the core, i have always believed that what sets america apart from every other nation is that we ordinary americans believe in possibilities. unlimited possibilities. the possibilities for a kid growing up in a poor inner city neighborhood or the spanish-speaking home. or a kid from mayfield and delaware, willow grove and the places jill and i grew up.

to be anything and to do anything that we want. that is what we were both taught, and that is what the president was taught. it was real. that is what i grew up believing. and it has been true in the country, and if we ever lose that, we will have lost something very special, we will have lost the very soul of this country. when i was growing up, my parents in tough times looked at me and would look at me and my brothers and my sisters and they would say, "it is is going to be okay." and they meant it. some of you cover me and i said, go back to your old neighborhoods and talk to the contemporaries and they are not as successful as you are, and l there are too many people in

america, too many parents who don't believe they can look at their kid in the eye and say with certitude, "honey, it is going to be okay." that is what we need to change, and it is not complicated. that is the true measure of the success and it will not have met it until every parent can look at the kid in tough times and say, honey, it is going to be okay, and mean it. that is our responsibility. i believe it is totally within our power. the nation has done it before in difficult times. i have had the very great good fortune and privilege of being in public service most of my adult life since i have been 25 years old. through personal triumphs and tragedies, and my son beau and my daughter ashley, and hunter and jill, and my whole family

and it may sound corny, but we found purpose in public life. we found purpose in public life. so we intend, the whole family and not just me, we intend to spend the next 15 months fighting for what we a alwalway cared about, what my family has cared about and with all of our being and working with the future nominee and the president and congress, and i am absolutely certain that we are capable of accomplishing extraordinary things. we can do this. and when we do, america won't just win the future, we will own the finish line. thank you for all being so gracious to jill and me, for the last six or eight months and for our whole career for that matter, but i am telling you that we can do so much more. i am looking forward to continuing to work with this man to get it done. thank you very much.

thank you all very much. [ applause ] all right. the word from the vice president of the united states, he said while i won't be a candidate i will not be silent making this statement in the rose garden and telling people that he won't run for the presidential nomination, but sounding like that is a speech that he would have delivered if he had made the opposite decision if he had decided to go ahead and challenge hillary clinton, and challenge bernie sanders and the other democrats for the nomination, and that is a speech that he also could have delivered at this time if the decision had gone the other way. jeff zeleny is standing by, and along with our white house correspondent michelle kaczynaski. and jeff, i'm surprised, because we have heard from several people including you and everyone that he is inclined to

run, but he finally made the decision to presumably today or last night that he had decided not to run. >> wolf, that is right. he was telling many of the long-time friends who served with him in the senate, and many of to ally tas he was leaning towards running and planning on running, and just a couple of hours ago, the head of the international firefighters union said they thought that he was run, because he is close to biden. but i am told that the decision came not today, but over a period of time, and he told some of the advisers this late monday that he was wonder ding about this, but what what he was doing yesterday was sending a message to some parting words if you will to hillary clinton directly about how he believes that this town should work, and that is, wolf, what is so struck here. and he is not running, but look, both sides have to come together, and when you are looking at what is happening in washington here, and we are on one side of pennsylvania avenue, and on the other side, paul ryan is doing the same thing, and joe biden had realized that time had

run short, and some of the people he had reached out to in the last couple of days or ten days or so who would have worked for him in iowa, new hampshire and south carolina, they had not heard back from him over the last several days, so they were wondering if he was serious about this, and he wanted to run for president, wolf. he wanted to do it, but he simply could not actually pull it together in the end, and he did not believe there was a winning path. >> and he specifically said that he was out of time to effectively run for the democratic presidential nomination even though the family was now on board, they had gone through several months of mourning obviously for the sudden loss of their son beau bid biden. and michelle, i want to get the you in a moment, but david axelrod is joining us on the phone, a former top adviser to president obama, and were you surprised, david? >> no. wolf, i wasn't. i said from the beginning that i thought that at the end of the day, he wouldn't run, because nobody understands the toll and

the cost of running on one's family and the cost than joe biden. we all laud him for being candid about the feelings and being open about his feelings, and he he has been telling us for months that he didn't know whether he had the emotional reserves to get there, and that kept him from doing what he obviously was drawn to do which is to run. i think that, that tug and pull was going on for months, and ultimately time ran out, because he could not resolve that question, that consulate. >> and i know that gloria, you have been hearing, and gloria borger with us as well, and you have been hearing for months of the really difficult arduous decision making that was going through the vice president and the family as a result of the loss of their son beau and now the decision coming forward in the last few minutes that the vice president will not run for president. and now, i want your reaction to the news.

>> well, if you listen to joe biden, it is clear that this is a man who really wanted to run, again, for president. but he said it himself and he told the truth as he very often does, look, i ran out of time. but he also said that he is a man who has found a purpose in public life. i think that what he tried to do was to set the stage for the next part of his public life which continues for the next 15 months, and he was very poignant about talking about finding a cure for cancer which is of course took his son beau, and it is clear to me from talking to his very close associates, friends, staff, and visors and that biden really wanted in his heart to do this. but he is a pragmatist and knows the toll it would take, as david was saying, he understood the organization that he would need, and, you know, in the end, he

made the decision not to do it even though, just a week ago in talking to his friends, he sounded more and more like a candidate. the more he talked about it, the more he got into it, and the more and more he got into it, but again, he just decided to pull back because as he said, himself, he was just flat out of time. he didn't have enough time to organi organize. >> jake tapper is with us as well. jake, i couldn't help but notice and you did as well the one statement that he made once again, and this is the fourth time he has said it that it is not naive to talk to republicans, and they are the opposition, and they are not our enemies, and that is going to be seeming a response to what hillary clinton said at the last cnn debate when she listed the republicans as her enemy. >> that is no question who he was addressing, and that is one of the reasons that we have heard the conflicting messages

from the vice president, and what we have heard this afternoon is a man who very definitively thinks that he would be the best president of all of the people running for president, but he says that he sees no path for him to get to the white house as president. that is why, you heard him give what sounded like almost a campaign address today talking about the kind of america that he would like to be president of, and he said that he would like, if he could be anything, he would like to be the president that cures cancer, and that is responsible for ending cancer, but at the same time, he is a realist as gloria said, and one of the things that has been really making this so difficult to the vice president is that he would like to do it so much, and yet, it is just very difficult for anybody to conjure forth any way in which he would get the democratic presidential nomination. liberals and progressives are with bernie sanders right now, and the party establishment and a lot of the people in the democratic base such as various

african-american groups and latino groups are seeming to support hillary clinton, and there didn't seem to be a way for him to get the nomination. you had poll after poll to showing him to be even if he joined the race he would come in third behind hillary and behind bernie, and democratic polls, that were less and less interested especially after last week's debate in having him join the race. so that is, i think that is the reason why there is a constant push and pull in what we heard from the vice president, and from those who spoke with the vice president. he thinks that he would be the best person to do the job, and yet, he also is somebody who has been around politics for a long time, and he does not see anyway that he can actually beat hillary clinton and become the democratic nominee. >> he is a realist and he specifically said that he is out of time to effectively challenge hillary clinton for that matter. and jake, all of the polls are showing that without joe biden

in the democratic contest, that is good news for hillary clinton because her numbers goes up, and she gains a lot more support than bernie sanders who is number two in the national polls. >> and let me say that hillary clinton and the advisers have been looking at the vice president for months and in trying to figure out how it is that they could defeat him if it came down to it. we heard that one of the pro hillary clinton groups was doing opposition research, and there are some democratic party elders who think that the reason that hillary clinton came out against that pacific trade deal that she worked to create as secretary of state but now as a candidate fending is nothing to do with bernie sanders but outmaneuvering joe biden who has strong ties to labor. and so some elders believe that hillary clinton move was paced on convincing joe biden that

there is not a lane in which to run. >> he obviously came to that conclusion as much as he would have loved to run for the president of the united states, and as much of the speech that he delivered in the rose garden could have been a speech that he would have made had he decided to run, but he has decided for practical reasons, he doesn't have a good chance, he is out of time for all practical purposes. jake will stay with us, and all of the reporters and the analysts will stay with us. i will throw it back to ashleigh right now, and pick up the coverage, but i will be back at the top of the hour with the big news, ashleigh hashgs the vice president of the united states telling the american people that he will not be seeking the democr democratic presidential nomination. >> it is news that people were wanting to hear one way or another. and i will tell you, as quickly as it came, wolf, there is a statement from the draft biden which is the organization behind the "run, joe, run" debate. and we are so grateful for the outpouring of the hundreds of thousands of americans to encourage the vice president to

run. while the vice president has decided not the run, we know that over the next year he is o going to be standing up for all americans and articulate a vision for the americans that will leave no one behind. that is the message that the vice president was delivering in the rose garden with the president and his wife behind him. if you missed it, it was only a short time ago andt let me replay a moment of the sound where the vice president made it crystal clear that he is onotis going to be running for president. >> as my family and i have worked through the grieving process. i have said all along what i have said time and again to others that it may very well be that the process by the time we get through it closes the window on mounting a realistic campaign for president. i have concluded that it has

closed. i know from previous experience that there is no timetable for this process, the process doesn't are respect or much care about things like filing deadlines or debates and primaries and caucuses, but i also know that i could do this, i couldn't do this if the family was not ready. the good news is that the family has reached that point, but as i have said many times, my family has suffered loss and, and i hope there would come a time and i have said it to many other families that sooner rather than later when you think of your loved one that it brings a smile to your lips before it brings a tear to your eyes. well, that is where the bidens are today. thank god. beau is our inspiration. unfortunately, i believe that we

are out of time. the time necessary to mount a winning campaign for the nomination. but while i will not be a candidate, i will not be silent. i intend to speak out clearly and forcefully to influence as much as i can where we stand as a party and where we need to go as a nation. and this is what i believe. u believe that president obama has led this nation from crisis to rekoh ri and we are now on the cusp of resurgence, and i am proud to the have played a part in that. and this party, our nation, will be making a tragic mistake if we walk away or attempt to un-do the obama legacy. i want to bring in our senior white house correspondent jim acosta who is standing by live. jim, one of the questions that

the people would have while the vice president says that i am not running, but i will not be sile silent. does that mean that he is vocal for one candidate over another, and i am asking if he is going to endorse hillary clinton if that is obvious or maybe not so much? >> well, it is a little too early for the endorsements, ashleigh, and vice president will be active in the campaign, and if hillary clinton is named the nominee of this party that vice president is going to be out there enthusiastically supporting her, but based on the vice president's comments over to the last few days in which he seemed to be really critiquing hillary clinton's comments especially when labeling republicans as enemies that the vice president had to get a message across and that message is that people in washington ought to be getting along a lot better than they are right now, and quite frankly that is a question that is going to be resonating with a lot of americans regardless of the political stripe. that is going to be coming in time, and i think that all wounds heal in time, but at the same time, ashleigh, vice

president biden was staring reality in the face, and looking at how far out hillary clinton was in fund-raising and organization, and they had put out a list of mayors who had endorsed her and she had done the legwork and the groundwork to build a formidable groundwork, and vice president biden had not done that. the only key player that we know about who was mobilizing to support him was the international firefighters union and i talked to if president of the uniyour harold schaffer who seemed revved up over the weekend, and sounded like joe biden would jump into the race, and i talked to him last night and this morning, and not so revved up, so clearly something changed in the last 48 to 72 hours, and it seems that the vice president and the team were coming to the conclusion, and this is why we heard vice president biden say what he said a few moments ago, and despite

the warm reception here for the vice president, i should caution everybody that even here at the white house there were doubts if vice president could pull it off. i talked to one senior official just recently who said that there is nobody in the white house who has a box of joe biden signs behind the desk, and partly while there is deep affection here of joe biden, they didn't believe he would overcome what hillary clinton had put together in the months leading up to where we are right now. and having said that, others who would love the to see him run for president and be president? absoluteliment but they see hillary clinton as somebody who is going to protect and extend the legacy of president obama, and some fearful in the white house who thought that joe biden had the potential to ruin that if he were not successful in the general election campaign. that is the frank candid assessment of some here in the white house, and they were concerned for joe biden to get into the race, and some pressure

on the vice president to come to this decision. i just have to say, it was extraordinary political theater to be out here, ashleigh. it is unbelievable to see us all called together at the last minute to witness what we saw, but in many ways, it was a kind of a fitting signoff for this vice president. he is going to be very active and vocal in the coming months, but the way that joe biden wrapped up his time here in washington and talked about what his son means to him and so forth, it was quite something to watch. ashleigh. >> i have to say that i asked wolf at the top of the show, is this the best kept secret in washington, because it is not often that you can scramble a news conference in the rose garden with potus standing behind you within minutes and nobody knowing it. and this is the proof, because we had the show planned today, and we are not going to do it, but we are going to be here. >> we will be here. >> and yes, we have numbers that might tell more of the story coming back after the break, and

joe biden may have said that the window is closing, but the numbers might be more significant. poll numbers, money number, and how does that all of that factor into this huge decision that was announced as the vice president emerged with the president and his wife to tell the press corps and the rest of us that he is not going to be running for president. the great beauty of owning a property is that you can create wealth through capital appreciation, and this has been denied to many south africans for generations.

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and could save you in out-of-pocket medical costs. call now to request your free decision guide. and learn more about the kinds of plans that will be here for you now - and down the road. i have a lifetime of experience. so i know how important that is. our breaking news here at cnn, the most sought after decision in the last several months, and that is will the vice president run for the democratic presidential nomination, and the answer was crystal clear with joe biden coming out to the rose garden flanked by the president and his

wife saying no, it is not going to happen, the window has closed in his estimation. he says that the family has supported him despite they have suffered the tremendous loss of the death of his son they would be ready, and that the window had closed and it was just not do-able. and other things that were announced in the rose garden and it is this. recent polling of cnn/orc releasing poll numbers suggesting that recently, with biden in the race, senator clinton would have this lead, 49 to 29 with biden and without the biden numbers, it would be 56 to 33% jump. those poll numbers don't necessarily lie, and a lot of people say they are power games, but poll iing matters and so do money. and when it it comes to money, hillary rodham clinton she has raised a lot of money, and in the third quarter her campaign

brought $28 million which brought the entire haul to $75 million, and that is brianna keilar who is going to join us live from washington, and briana, yes, you can say that the window is closing, and say that technically it is tougher and tougher to mount this campaign, but realistically, the door was open. he could still get on the ballot in all of the states that he needed to, and so was this more about money and polling or about the technicality sfs >> i think that it is a little bit about both. i think that it became clear as early as january 2014 that the lane for the vice president was getting narrower than certainly he had wanted, when the priorities usa the big donor super pac who had backed president obama in the election of 2012 shifted over to say it would support hillary clinton if she chose to run. we saw that super pac hire a number of long-time obama hands,

former obama hands including his 2012 campaign manager jim massena, and that is a stinging moment for vice president joe biden where it appear ed that hillary clinton had been anointed as the caretaker of president obama's legacy over him, and that is very difficult. i will tell you that we are getting a little bit of reaction unofficial here, and we are waiting for the official head quarters are from the brooklyn headquarters of hillary clinton, but one aid saying that joe biden is going to be a big asset in the general e heck shun and the assumption there that hillary clinton is the nominee, and they are of course relieved as you spelled out in the poll numbers, but they are trying to offer goodwill in what is a difficult decision. one thing to note, ashleigh, i mow e that the vice president had been telling some of his friends that he did feel that he was the best person for the job in the field in the prospective field. so this is a difficult decision for him certainly.

>> briana, stand by, and i want to go over to capitol hill where dana bash is going to join us live. i was going to ask you about paul ryan and the possibility if he gets to run for speaker if he gets the demands that he wants, but i won't do that, because i want to know if you have reaction from capitol hill on this? >> not official reaction no, but hearing from the people here, and remember that joe biden spent a lot of time here, decades in the u.s. senate, so certainly, he has a lot of friends here. and even some of those who really like joe biden are relieved that he is not running. because of the concern that it would divide the party and i just got an e-mail from a democratic official who said that was concerned about the tone that biden repeated actually today about, you know, clearly aimed at hillary clinton saying that republicans are not our enemies and we have are to get together and work together many this official has said that it is stoking division within

the party, and he needs to either get on board or get out of the way. and presumably joe biden will get on board at some point with the hillary clinton campaign obviously, which is the next big question whether or not he is going to endorse hillary clinton or stay on the sidelines and watch the big fight between hillary clinton and joe biden, and so i want to say what some people are reiterating from their sources and my sources, also, and in the campaign in waiting that there really was a campaign in waiting, and there is a lot of surprise here given the moves that they made over the past week or so they decided to bow out. >> dana bash, thank you. i want to bring in ron brownstein who is the cnn edi r editor, and get on board or get out of the way, and ron, do you believe he is going to stand behind hillary clinton before or after a nominee is chosen

presumably if it is hillary? >> and certainly a nominee, and him not running increases her o position, and joe biden faced a uphill climb, but if he did, he was a missile aimed directly at her coalition, and the intrin c intrinsics are the white working class voters which are stronger than bernie sanders, and he was a threat to her hold on the minority voters which are her firewall. and once you get past the all-white states of iowa and new hampshire and the more diverse states in the coalition, and without him there, bernie sanders has a doubly larger challenge to break into the minority vote which could be so crucial to her. >> ron, thank you for the insight. i know that you will have more to say about this, and c nshgs nshn is covering this throughout the day today and just a recap if you are watching, and blink and you missed it. the vice president without any warning, really, coming into the rose garden at the white house with the president behind him to announce that he in fact would not be seeking any kind of

position in the presidential race and certainly not running for the democratic presidential nomination, and as ron brownstein says paves the way for hillary rodham clinton and certainly when the polling does not include joe biden the numbers do soar. thank you for joining us, everyone. i will turn it over to my colleague wolf blitzer who will start right after this break.

-- captions by vitac -- www.vitac.com hello, i'm wolf blitzer and wherever you are watching from around the world, thanks for joining us. we begin with breaking news. the vice president of the united states joe biden announcing just moments ago he will not, repeat, not be running for president of the united states. he ended weeks of speculation with the surprise news conference, statement at the white house rose garden explain nag the loss of his son beau had