Indiana Senator Evan Bayh to back New York Senator Hillary Clinton

The Politico reports:
Sen. Evan Bayh (D-Ind.) will endorse Sen. Hillary Clinton (D-N.Y.) on Monday, Democratic sources tell Politico.com.

Bayh is a moderate Democrat whose blessing could help Clinton pick up votes in Republican states.

Indiana is among the most reliably Republican states — “the reddest of the red,” as one Democratic official put it. The Hoosier State went 57 percent for George W. Bush in 2000 and 60 percent for President Bush’s reelection in 2004.

Clinton’s campaign is clearly thrilled to be getting the nod.

“Hillary Clinton to Receive Major National Endorsement on Monday,” said a release from the campaign this evening. The news conference is at 1 p.m. at a hotel on Capitol Hill.

Bayh, a former chair of the centrist Democratic Leadership Council, had sought the Democratic nomination himself but abandoned his quest in December in the face of the strong machines being built by Clinton and Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.).

At the time, Bayh said in a statement: “The odds were always going to be very long for a relatively unknown candidate like myself, a little bit like David and Goliath.”

Bayh, who had already been oft-discussed as a promising potential vice presidential pick for Clinton, had held back on endorsing her in part because of doubts about her popularity in Indiana, Democratic sources said.

His endorsement could help undermine the argument of her rivals for the Democratic nomination that she would not be electable in a national contest.

Clinton and Bayh serve together on the Senate Armed Services Committee.

In January, they appeared at a news conference together after a congressional-delegation visit to armed forces serving in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Clinton, noting that she and Bayh sat next to each other on Armed Services, announced then that she and Bayh were sending a letter to Defense Secretary Robert Gates “reflecting what we heard from our military commanders: they asked for additional troops.”

In March, Clinton was endorsed by former Iowa Gov. Tom Vilsack, who had ended his Democratic presidential campaign a month before. Earlier this month, she was endorsed by retired four-star Army Gen. Wesley Clark, who ran for the Democratic nomination in 2004 and considered doing so again this year.