PEROT BOWS OUT : Bush Halts Vacation to Fish for Perot Backers : Republicans: President also refuses to rule out possibility that Baker will return to run campaign.

President Bush interrupted a fishing vacation to appeal for the support of Ross Perot’s backers Thursday, saying they “want to see the kind of changes I want to see.”

He also pointedly refused to foreclose the possibility that Secretary of State James A. Baker III will leave his post to help him win reelection. A senior White House official said Perot’s abrupt withdrawal from the presidential race actually increases the likelihood that Baker will do so.

“I think it probably increases the chances of it happening because it forces everyone to look at this race with a sense of urgency,” the official said. “We’re going to be 22 points down by Monday, and we’ve got to get our act together.”

Perot announced earlier in the day that he would not run as an independent, saying he cannot win and that his presence would throw the election into the House of Representatives, disrupting the country.

Bush told reporters in a hastily called news conference near the foothills of the Wind River mountain range that Perot’s decision “helps me and I think most people think so.” He said he called Perot after he heard the news and congratulated him “on the way he energized so many people.”

Bush, in the midst of a vacation with Baker, a son and Baker’s son, drove about two miles from Baker’s 1,700-acre ranch to an Air Force outpost for the news conference. The site is used to test seismic equipment for monitoring nuclear tests. Wearing hiking boots, a Western shirt and a tie, Bush stood at a lectern on a black rubber mat that covered a cleared patch of sagebrush.

Just as Perot’s announcement brought Bush out of the wilderness for the news conference, his advisers hope it will bring him out of the political wilderness as well--because historically the President has run best when he can concentrate on one opponent.

“I see this as a positive development in a sense because I am convinced the conservatives who are supporting Ross Perot, the legions of conservative people, will end up being with me, because I think they share the same values that I speak about,” Bush said.

Bush said he was fishing in a creek when a military aide approached him Thursday morning and told him that Perot was about to hold a news conference. Then, at 9:15 a.m. local time, White House Chief of Staff Samuel K. Skinner called Bush and reported the news.

“I was surprised because Ross Perot has energized a lot of people in this country,” Bush said later.

Although Bush had begun in recent weeks to make slightly veiled, negative references to his would-be rival--and Vice President Dan Quayle had called him a “temperamental tycoon”--on Thursday Bush took pains to avoid saying anything critical about the Texas billionaire.

Perot’s supporters are crucial to assembling winning margins in such key states as Texas, Florida and California, and Bush can ill afford to antagonize them. Besides, he said, “I never like to lose friends over politics.”

The President’s comments on Baker’s future were his most extensive in public in recent days on one of the central questions facing his campaign.

There has been wide speculation from well-informed sources close to Bush, Baker and the campaign that the secretary of state would take the reins of Bush’s current campaign--either from within the reelection committee or the White House. Baker ran Bush’s successful 1988 presidential campaign; they have been friends for 30 years.

Asked if he could resolve such speculation, Bush said: “I can’t resolve it at all. It’s 3 o’clock in Wyoming and, honestly, I have not yet talked to Jim Baker about it.”

But, he said, he did not feel inclined to rule out the possibility. “I’m going to win this election and I want the best team around me. He’s got a full portfolio, but who knows?” Bush said.

The President insisted several times that his conversation with Baker had not touched on politics during the two days they have spent at the ranch.

Times staff writer Douglas Jehl contributed to this story.