Bloomberg - Nov. 29 (Bloomberg) -- Senate Republican Leader Bill Fristwon't seek his party's presidential nomination in 2008, sayingthe ``season of being an elected official has come to a close.''
Nov. 29 (Bloomberg) -- Senate Republican Leader Bill Frist won't seek his party's presidential nomination in 2008, saying the ``season of being an elected official has come to a close.''
``I do not intend to run for president in 2008,'' Frist said in a statement. Frist didn't seek re-election to the Senate representing Tennessee this year and is leaving Congress.
He had little chance of success in a presidential bid, said Norm Ornstein of the American Enterprise Institute, a public policy organization in Washington.
``Let's face it, this would have been a steeply uphill struggle,'' Ornstein said.
A heart surgeon, Frist made his first bid for public office in 1994 when he successfully challenged incumbent Democratic Senator Jim Sasser of Tennessee. Frist became Senate majority leader in 2002. He was President George W. Bush's choice to replace Trent Lott of Mississippi as majority leader when Lott stepped aside after making racially insensitive remarks.
Frist has struggled to navigate dual roles as leader and presidential aspirant, and his higher ambitions were clouded in September when the SEC began a probe of his decision in June 2005 to sell shares in HCA Inc., a hospital chain founded by his father and brother. The sale, completed by July 1 that year, came weeks before the company issued a second-quarter earnings estimate that failed to meet analysts' expectations, pushing down HCA's stock price.
To contact the reporters on this story: Laura Litvan in Washington at
llitvan@bloomberg.net .
11-29-2006, 02:30 PM
