Sitting with Maddow in her Massachusetts home, a noticeably quieter Warren reacted to Maddow’s question with incredulous laughter before saying, “Oh, my gosh. Are you asking me that today?”

Maddow proceeded to point out that if Warren were to run in eight years, she would still be younger than Bernie Sanders, who is competing neck and neck with Joe Biden for the Democratic nomination. Warren laughed some more, before acknowledging: “I have not ruled it out.”

“I just — I think I heard my husband laughing over there,” Warren said.

Shortly after Warren made her remarks, her communications director, Kristen Orthman, tweeted: “Dude she was joking.“

Warren said she would not be endorsing a candidate on Thursday, but that hasn’t stopped Sanders from trying to court her supporters.

When asked when she would be making an endorsement, Warren said she didn’t have a timeline.

“I had a lot I needed to do today,” she said. “So, I’ll get up tomorrow morning and start thinking about that question.”

Maddow also asked Warren whether she had thought about running with one of her fellow Democrats for vice president. Soon after her withdrawal from the race, rumors of Warren‘s joining forces with Sanders began to circulate. But Warren said she hadn‘t given the idea any thought.

“I‘ve been running for president because I‘m ready to be president,“ she said.

She also took credit for crushing Mike Bloomberg‘s dreams of the party‘s nomination after he entered the race late and spent a fortune on advertising. Maddow brought up Warren‘s face-off with the billionaire former mayor of New York during the Democratic debate in mid-February, during which the progressive candidate cited numerous allegations of sexist behavior. Bloomberg dropped out of the race on Wednesday.

When Maddow asked Warren whether ending his candidacy was her goal in the debate, she answered flatly, “Yes.“

“Do you take credit?“ Maddow asked.

“Sure,“ Warren replied. “But the point is he‘s not going to be the Democratic nominee and he shouldn‘t be the Democratic nominee. In my view he was absolutely the riskiest candidate for Democrats on that stage.“

