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Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont met with Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. for an hour on Thursday to discuss campaign finance reform, college affordability and other issues at the heart of Mr. Sanders’s campaign for the 2016 Democratic presidential nomination.

Mr. Biden announced last week that he would not seek the party’s nomination, leaving the race to Mr. Sanders, Hillary Rodham Clinton and former Gov. Martin O’Malley of Maryland.

Mrs. Clinton, the leading Democratic candidate, has a long history of public friendliness and private clashes and rivalry with Mr. Biden, especially during her four years as President Obama’s first secretary of state. Yet Mr. Sanders, one of two independents in the Senate and a self-described democratic socialist, has disagreed with Mr. Biden on issues as well, with Mr. Sanders among the politically liberal opponents to free trade deals.

A Sanders spokesman said he did not know whether Mr. Sanders or Mr. Biden first proposed the meeting, which took place at the vice president’s residence at the Naval Observatory in Washington. The spokesman, Michael Briggs, said that the idea of a meeting came up when the two men spoke by phone after Mr. Biden disclosed he would not be a candidate for president. Mr. Briggs said that during Thursday’s meeting, Mr. Sanders did not ask for Mr. Biden’s support in the Democratic nomination race.

Mr. Sanders, in a statement after the meeting, said, “Under the leadership of President Obama and Vice President Biden, this country has come a long way economically since President Bush left office and we were losing 800,000 jobs every month and the world economy was on the brink of financial collapse.”

“Nevertheless, we still have a long way to go to create the kind of economy that works for all Americans and not just the top 1 percent,” Mr. Sanders added. “I look forward to working with President Obama and Vice President Biden to tackle some to the major issues facing our country.”

