Rice Pours Cold Water On Veep Speculation

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice is looking to tamp down on speculation that she is campaigning to become presumptive GOP nominee John McCain's running mate. Rice said today that she will likely return to Stanford University, where she served as Provost and remains a professor, after her present work is done.

"I very much look forward to watching this campaign and voting as a voter," Rice said. "I have a lot of work to do and then I'll happily go back to Stanford."

Some background: Back on March 26th, we reported that the Secretary of State made an appearance at a high-powered Republican gathering run by Grover Norquist. The appearance prompted a tipster to Steve Clemons to say, "Someone like Condi Rice doesn't go to Grover Norquist's den to talk about the Annapolis Middle East peace process. She's going to secure her future in Republican politics and to position herself as a 'potential' VP candidate on the McCain ticket."

The Condi veep speculation didn't immediately take off, but it got a big boost on Sunday, when Republican strategist and former Bush administration official Dan Senor suggested on ABC that Rice has been "actively, actually in recent weeks, campaigning for" the number two slot. He cited her appearance at the meeting as evidence of her alleged behind-the-scenes campaign.

Rice's interest in the job may not matter all that much: Sources tell CBS News that the McCain campaign has thus far shown little enthusiasm at the prospect of a McCain/Rice ticket. Watch Rice's comments on the veep talk below: