Democrats mobilise to build support for Clinton candidacy Hillary Clinton has not yet declared her candidacy More than two years ahead of the 2016 presidential election and before she has even declared her candidacy, Democratic power brokers and fundraisers are swinging behind Hillary Clinton as the party's nominee for US president. The latest sign the party wants to entrench the former New York senator as its candidate, and fortify her against coming Republican attacks, is the decision of Priorities USA, the largest Democratic-aligned campaign group, formally to start raising money for her. The super-political action committee was established to buttress Barack Obama against a wave of attacks adverts from Republican campaign groups in the 2012 presidential poll. "This is an unprecedented move - I have not seen an instance where there is a broad consensus this early by party figures that one person is their choice," said Norm Ornstein, of the American Enterprise Institute, a Washington think-tank. In a sign of how the once warring Clinton and Obama wings of the party are drawing together, Jim Messina, a former White House deputy chief of staff who ran Mr Obama's re-election campaign, is taking over as co-chair of the super-Pac. The board of Priorities USA has also been broadened in an effort to minimise the often damaging infighting that traditionally takes places within political parties as different candidates battle for the nomination. "I think the numbers clearly show that she's the strongest presidential candidate on the Democratic side - and Priorities is going to be there for her if she decides to run," Mr Messina told the New York Times. A second super-Pac, called Ready for Hillary, is already up and running, and raising money, and Democratic operatives have worried that it could conflict with bodies such as Priorities USA. "I am sure that the forces in the Democratic party that want her to run are going to do everything in their power to make her the inevitable and invincible candidate," said William Galston, of the Brookings Institution, who worked in Bill Clinton's White House. I am sure that the forces in the Democratic party that want her to run are going to do everything in their power to make her the inevitable and invincible candidate William Galston, Brookings Institution Joe Biden, vice-president, has also been spoken about as a possible candidate, but he appears to be waiting to see what Mrs Clinton does. Mrs Clinton has not declared herself a candidate. "The Democrats" bench strength is not that strong," said Mr Galston. The travails of Chris Christie, the Republican New Jersey governor, battling scandals on a number of fronts, underlines how the timeframe for readying candidates for presidential runs is becoming earlier for both parties. Mr Christie's problems have national implications, because many powerful conservative fundraisers had already earmarked him as a candidate they were willing to back in 2016, but he now may be badly damaged. Super-Pacs are a relatively recent phenomenon in US politics, set up in the wake of a series of court decisions in recent years which abolished restrictions on donations to outside campaign bodies. Candidates" official organisations still face legal caps on donations from individuals and groups, but super-Pacs face no such constraints, making them potentially powerful allies, or foes. Their only constraint is that they cannot co-ordinate their work with the candidates" campaigns. Republican outside campaign groups, including super-Pacs, far outraised Democratic-aligned bodies before the 2012 election, and are already spending heavily ahead of the 2014 congressional midterms. The early efforts to cement Mrs Clinton as the Democrats" candidate may be designed to protect her against conservative campaign organisations once they turn their guns on her. "We will start to see a really aggressive and well-financed effort to trash her - some of the outside stuff will be really ugly," said Mr Ornstein. Mrs Clinton's spokesman declined to comment.