WASHINGTON – Democratic House Speaker Nancy Pelosi seems to think so. But she is touting Rep. Chet Edwards of Texas, not former presidential candidate John Edwards who twice ran for president and was the Democrats vice presidential candidate in 2004.
For the past few weeks, Pelosi, who will chair the Democratic National Convention in Denver in late August, has been talking up the nine-term congressman from central Texas as a possible running-mate for Barack Obama.
She floated the idea to Obama’s vice presidential search team a few weeks ago and again on Tuesday more publicly, at a breakfast with a group of reporters.
“I’ve had no conversations with the Obama campaign,” Edwards told Reuters on Capitol Hill. But he added that he was “humbled” that Pelosi would suggest him and left the door open to the possibility.
Edwards is known on Capitol Hill as an articulate centrist Democrat with a proven ability to win in a congressional district with a Republican tilt. His work on expanding veterans’ health and education benefits and his southern, fiscal conservative credentials could also help round out a ticket headed by a man seen as a liberal northerner.
