Warner Won't Seek Allen's Senate Seat

Voters need a reason to oust an incumbent, Allen advisers said. Warner supports school standards of learning, welfare reform and parole abolition -- all programs started by Allen when he was governor in the mid-1990s.

"We're focused on the reelection," Miller said. "We know the Democrats will decide on their own who their nominee is going to be. We're not taking anything for granted."

Recent public polls, however, have indicated that Warner is popular with nearly three-quarters of the state's residents and would beat Allen in a two-way race if it were held today. Warner, who lost a Senate bid in 1996 against Sen. John W. Warner (R), believes he could have beaten Allen in 2006, aides close to him said.

Steve Jarding, who ran Warner's gubernatorial campaign in 2001, said Warner is weary and not ready to launch a bitter race. Jarding said the governor is not afraid.

"If Mark Warner wanted to be in the U.S. Senate, he'd be a very, very hard candidate to beat," Jarding said. "Fear would be kind of a silly thought."

Jarding said he expects Warner to use the next year to travel across the country assessing the reception to his ideas.

"It's a meat-grinder business at the presidential level," Jarding said. "If that's what he chooses, it's going to be tough. But I won't underestimate him."

Warner's decision leaves Virginia Democrats with no obvious candidate to take on Allen, who has said he plans to run for reelection before making any formal decision about running for president.

Former lieutenant governor Donald S. Beyer (D), who has been mentioned as a possible Allen challenger, has told associates that he is not interested in taking on the senator. Former congressman L.F. Payne (D), who represented central and southern Virginia, and former Navy secretary James Webb have also been mentioned as possible candidates.

Cranwell said he and other Democratic leaders are talking with several possible candidates who could present Allen with a serious challenge.

"You can rest assured that I will beat the bushes until I find someone to run against Allen," Cranwell said. He said he is not disappointed by Warner's decision because he believes that the governor has a bright future in national politics.

"He's brought to Virginia a bipartisan effort that has put Virginia back on track," he said. "We are in need of that on the national level."

Warner has been coy about his future, declining to say whether he intends to run for president, in part for legal reasons: As soon as he confirms he is running, federal laws require that he establish a formal exploratory committee.

But aides say Warner is doing everything he can to be ready to make that announcement. He has formed a federal leadership PAC, called Forward Together, and this summer hired Monica Dixon, a former top aide to then-Vice President Al Gore. Last week, one of the Democratic Party's most experienced Internet specialists formally signed on.

Jerome Armstrong, who served as a key member of Howard Dean's Internet team in 2004, said in a post on his blog that he will be Warner's Internet director. "Warner's said that he wants to be part of the national Democratic Party dialogue, with Forward Together, and I've been hired to facilitate that over the Internet," he wrote.