Dodd, Biden drop out after Iowa defeat

Two Senate veterans — Democrats Joe Biden of Delaware and Chris Dodd of Connecticut — are abandoning their presidential campaigns after very poor showings Thursday night in the Iowa caucuses.

Neither mustered more than 1 percent in the intensely competitive contest won by freshman Illinois Sen. Barack Obama.

Biden was the most promising of the second-tier candidates, in large part because of his extensive national security experience, his chairmanship of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and his realist view of the Iraq war.


It was his second run for the Democratic presidential nomination, the first being in 1988.

Dodd banked his presidential run on a strong finish in Iowa and moved his family to Iowa but never gained any traction with his message.

Biden, in an announcement to a group of supporters, thanked his volunteers and staff for sticking with him. He finished fifth.

Dodd, who finished sixth, is expected to announce his withdrawal later.

Earlier Thursday, Dodd had told Fox News that he would head home to Hartford, Conn., if he did not finish fourth or better.

Dodd’s campaign did not return calls Thursday night seeking comment on his plans.

It’s not clear whom Dodd and Biden might endorse now that they’re leaving the race.

Biden’s campaign stood out primarily because he took a different approach to the Iraq war, saying the country should be divided into three different states in order to maintain the peace.

During the long series of Democratic debates, he tried to tone down the anti-war rhetoric with a more reasoned approach to ending the war, but his nuanced message never resonated with Iowa voters.

He was also plagued, as he has been for much of his career, by his tendency to be verbose on the campaign trail.

He is known for giving long, extemporaneous speeches and created a brief firestorm early in his campaign by describing Obama as “clean” and “articulate.”

Dodd’s presidential campaign will be remembered mostly for his impressive fundraising from the financial services world.

It certainly didn’t hurt that he’s the chairman of the committee that regulates the financial and banking industries, and he wasn’t shy about raising around 25 percent of his $13.6 million from the industry.

Yet regardless of his fundraising prowess, Dodd joined Biden as the latest in a long line of politicians whose stature in the Senate did not translate into any success on the presidential campaign trail.

The Connecticut senator moved his family to Iowa and even put his young children in Iowa public schools to show how serious he was about a grass-roots campaign.

But he never drew more than single digits in polls, despite his impressive fundraising.

One of Dodd’s primary problems was that he never found a message that distinguished him from the front-runners, and his candidacy was lumped together with Biden’s.

Dodd’s candidacy may be just a footnote in the history books — much like those of former Republican Sen. Phil Gramm of Texas and GOP Sens. Dick Lugar of Indiana and Orrin G. Hatch of Utah — but his campaign had two notable moments.

First, he took the unorthodox step of announcing his run for the White House a year ago on the "Imus in the Morning" radio show.

Second, he was one of two candidates — the other was New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson — who demanded to be allowed to answer debate questions in Spanish on the Spanish-language station Univision.

The debate rules called for the candidates to answer in English.

In recent months, Dodd tried to stake out more aggressive stances in the Senate, attempting to filibuster the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act and backing a more aggressive pace for Iraq troop withdrawal than his opponents did.

But none of his tactics gained traction with Iowa voters on Thursday night.

Dodd can easily transition back to his day job later this month, when the Senate convenes Jan. 22.

And he’ll have plenty of time to show up for hearings and legislative markups of the Banking Committee, where some critics have said he has been an absentee landlord while running for president.