A detail that is important as Eliot Spitzer is finally acknowledging publicly his deep desire to get back into politics – and his insistence that he’s never said he wouldn’t run again – is something I reported on earlier today: He has discussed with his wife Silda whether she would be open to him running this year.
Her response? It’s too soon, according to sources familiar with the discussion (and what may have been discussions, plural).
It does not sound like Silda Wall Spitzer, a force in her own right who initially wanted him to fight back against calls for his resignation, necessarily said “never,” but sources say she did express reservations about what a run would do to their family, which includes three growing, but not grown, daughters.
That said, it also sounds like Spitzer is still struggling with that, based on his interview with Fortune’s Peter Elkind, although he has said – and says again in the magazine interview, in his most remorseful comments yet – that having an intact family after their past two years is worth more than anything to him.
The Elkind write-up includes a paraphrase from the author saying the ex-governor could instantly drop $10 million of his own money on a race – including this year – if he saw an opening and if his family were to give him the green light.”
He clearly has seen an opening – he had talked up either Senate against Kirsten Gillibrand or state comptroller against Tom DiNapoli, as The Post reported – but so far the light isn’t green.