July 16, 2000: 'This Week': Interviews Bush

July 16 -- Republican presidential contender George W. Bush is getting closer to picking his running mate, but still refuses to divulge his list of candidates or the precise timing of his announcement.

“I haven’t ruled anybody out,” the Texas governor said this morning in an exclusive interview on ABCNEWS’ This Week.

Asked if he needed to pick an anti-abortion rights candidate to satisfy conservatives in the Republican Party, Bush said, “This is a pick that’s based on two very important criteria.”

The first, he said, is whether the prospective running mate could handle presidential duties. The second is “compatability.”

“Can we get along, can the person be added value,” Bush said.

Bush’s continued refusal to rule out an abortion-rights supporter could mean good news for either Gov. George Pataki of New York, with whom Bush had two meetings on Friday, or Gov. Tom Ridge of Pennsylvania, who made a public appearance with Bush on Thursday.

Both Pataki and Ridge favor abortion rights, although Pataki has drawn less criticism from conservatives for his views.

On Saturday, Bush met with Dick Cheney, the head of his vice-presidential selection process, for nearly three-and-a-half hours at the governor’s mansion in Austin. Neither man revealed any details about what they discussed, but both Bush campaign manager Joe Allbaugh and strategist Karl Rove participated in at least part of the meeting.

Previously, Bush has said that only three people — himself, his wife Laura, and Cheney — have known his thinking about choosing a vice-presidential candidate. So the presence of Allbaugh and Rove at the meeting could indicate that the selection process may be speeding up.

Bush himself said he had “two options” concerning the timing of a vice-presidential announcement, “one is at the convention and one is prior to the convention.”