Super-delegate Sherrod: No favorite yet

U.S. Sen. Sherrod Brown, one of Ohio’s Democratic “super-delegates” being courted by the Clinton and Obama campaigns, said he won’t commit to one candidate or the other until after Ohio’s March 4 primary – and maybe not then.

“I don’t know what I’m going to do,’’ Brown said in a meeting with the Enquirer’s editorial board Monday.

Brown said he would be guided, in part, by how Ohio Democrats vote when they go to the polls March 4, although he said he may wait even longer than that.

Ohio will have 162 delegates to the Democratic National Convention. Brown is one of 39 ‘super-delegates” who are party leaders, elected officials and others named by the party. The super-delegates not bound by the March 4 primary results; and are being heavily courted by both the Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama camps.

Brown said both campaigns are lobbying for his vote.

One night recently, he said, he was at home when the phone rang and the person on the other end said: “President Clinton would like to speak with you.”

“When he came on the line, I stood up,’’ Brown said. “My wife said, ‘you wouldn’t have stood up if it had been President Bush calling.’’’

Brown said that of the two candidates – both Senate colleagues – he knows Clinton the best.

“Her office is right across the hall from mine,’’ Brown said. “I see her all the time. I don’t know Barack as well.”