This post has been updated.
Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush (R) on Sunday said that he’ll make a decision whether to run for president in 2016 by the end of this year, according to the Washington Post.
Bush said he would base his decision on whether a candidate can “run with a hopeful, optimistic message, hopefully with enough detail to give people a sense that it’s not just idle words and not get back into the vortex of the mud fight.”
Bush spoke at an event celebrating 25 years since the presidency of his father, George H.W. Bush. Parts of the interview were later broadcast on Fox News.
He also said he needed to consider how a bid for the White House would impact his family.
“I just don’t want to go through that until the right time,” he said. “And it turns out that not running has generated more interest than if I said I was running. It’s kind of weird. I’m not that smart, I promise you, it just kind of happened that way.”
Bush also weighed in on issues like immigration. He said that the U.S. needs to address its immigration system, and that undocumented immigrants haven’t necessarily committed a felony, but an “act of love.”
