President Obama acknowledged Monday that Rahm Emanuel’s time in the West Wing may be coming to an end, as his chief of staff moves closer to a run for mayor of Chicago.
"I think that Rahm will have to make a decision quickly,” the president said in an interview with NBC’s Matt Lauer. “Running for mayor of Chicago is a serious enterprise, and I know this is something he is thinking about.
Obama, speaking on NBC's Today show, said Emanuel has not revealed his decision to him.
Emanuel, a former Chicago-area
congressman, has been meeting with other potential candidates in recent weeks,
sharing private polling to signal his strength as a would-be candidate.
Emanuel has until Nov. 22 to file paperwork for the Chicago mayor's race early next year. But there are already news stories questioning whether Emanuel can plot a big city campaign and run the White House at the same time.
Obama said Emanuel would make "an excellent mayor," but "until he makes a decision, I'm not going to be making decisions about how I'm going to approach it."
Obama's comments came during an
interview otherwise focused on the subject of education, in which he touted his
administration's Race to the Top program. He also announced a new goal of
recruiting 10,000 science and math teachers in the next two years, saying
nothing could be more important to the
future of the nation's economy.
