Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) says he will not run for president as an Independent if he falls short in his bid to secure the Democratic 2016 nomination.

Speaking at the Newseum in Washington on Thursday, Sanders said that if he ran a third-party campaign, it would draw support away from the Democratic nominee, potentially handing Republicans the White House.

“I would not want to be responsible for electing some right-wing Republican president,” Sanders said.

However, Sanders, an Independent and self-described socialist who caucuses with Democrats in the Senate, acknowledged that it was something he considered.

“As I was contemplating what I’d do, one decision I had to make was, there were a lot of people telling me to run as an Independent,” Sanders said. “They said the Republican Party is an extreme right-wing party, and the Democratic Party is too conservative, too cozied-up to big money … and that I should run outside of the two party system.”