Joe Biden did the right thing for his party, his family and himself when he decided not to run for president in 2016. Most consequential of all, he did the right thing for Hillary Clinton.

Now Clinton has the opportunity to consolidate her position as the front-runner for the Democratic nomination and expand her lead. Polls had indicated that she would be the main beneficiary if Biden didn't run.

A recent CNN/ORC survey found that 45 percent of Democrats supported Clinton while 29 percent supported Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont, her chief rival, and 18 percent backed a hypothetical Biden candidacy. Without Biden in the race, Clinton's lead widened to 23 percentage points from 16, with Clinton at 56 and Sanders at 33.

Another advantage for Clinton, a former secretary of state and senator from New York, is that she won't have to compete with Biden for support from the coalition that backed President Barack Obama for two terms, which includes African-Americans and Latinos. Sanders has shown limited ability to win over these groups so far.

Biden's decision not to run, announced Wednesday, also gives her a greater opportunity to win endorsements from organized labor, and will allow her to save money from what would have been an expensive ad campaign against Biden.



"She was the likely nominee yesterday, and she's the slightly more likely nominee today," David Axelrod, formerly Obama's chief strategist, told The Washington Post. But Axelrod also saw a negative side for Clinton. "The absence of Biden and the [Biden-related] intrigue poses a different challenge for her," Axelrod added. "She never handles prosperity well. What she shouldn't do is retreat into a zone of comfort here, of reticence and caution.'

Clinton's standing in the polls has rebounded in the past month as Democratic voters warmed again to her, especially after her solid performance in the first Democratic debate. But polls show that many Americans still doubt her trustworthiness and consider her too secretive.



As for Vice President Biden, Democratic strategists say his only realistic path to the nomination would have been through Clinton, by raising more questions about her as he tried to dislodge her as the front-runner. This in turn would have exposed Biden to the criticism that he was trying to stop Clinton from making history as the first woman to become a major-party presidential nominee and win the White House. In the end, Biden didn't want to be known as a spoiler, his allies say.

Biden, a former longtime senator from Delaware, faced other problems. At 72, he had the image of a politician from the past and a Washington insider at a time when voters seem to want something new and are angry with Washington. He was very far behind in organization and fundraising.