Washington - The First Lady, Mrs Hillary Rodham Clinton, sought the advice of retiring New York Democratic Senator, Mr Daniel Patrick Moynihan, yesterday on whether she should run for Mr Moynihan's seat in 2000.
Their White House meeting was part of her plan to seek opinion about a possible run from various knowledgeable people as she gives what she called on Tuesday "careful thought to a potential candidacy".
Meanwhile, President Clinton said yesterday the year-long sex scandal that nearly resulted in his being ousted from office has not harmed the US presidency.
"I hope that the presidency has not been harmed. I don't believe it has been," Mr Clinton told a news conference with the French President, Mr Jacques Chirac. Just a week after his acquittal in the Senate impeachment trial, Mr Clinton faces a fresh scandal about his past sexual conduct after a former campaign worker alleged that he raped her 21 years ago.
Ms Juanita Broaddrick, who now runs a nursing-home business in Arkansas, told the Wall Street Journal that Mr Clinton raped her in the Camelot Hotel in Little Rock in 1978, when he was the state attorney-general.