Bill Clinton to aid McAuliffe on Virginia campaign trail
By: William C. Flook
Examiner Staff Writer
April 22, 2009
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| Former President Bill Clinton shares a joke with former Democratic National Committee Chairman Terry McAuliffe. Clinton will join McAuliffe on the campaign trail Monday. (AP) |
Former President Bill Clinton will join his longtime ally Terry McAuliffe on Monday as the Virginia Democratic gubernatorial candidate stumps in Richmond and Roanoke, McAuliffe’s campaign said Wednesday.
The two-term U.S. president is the biggest national figure to step into the state’s increasingly intense three-way Democratic primary.
Clinton, who in February headlined the party’s Jefferson-Jackson Dinner in Richmond, was widely expected to put his weight behind McAuliffe on the campaign trail. The trip will be Clinton’s first to Virginia explicitly to support his close friend.
The commonwealth did not go for Clinton during either of his presidential campaigns in the 1990s, and didn’t break for his wife, Hillary, during the 2008 Democratic presidential primary, a campaign McAuliffe headed.
Nevertheless, Bill Clinton is thought to lend McAuliffe heft with blue-collar voters outside his base of Northern Virginia. He will need those votes to surmount his two Democratic primary opponents June 9.
State Sen. Creigh Deeds is from rural Bath County and enjoys support among working-class, down-state Democrats. Former Del. Brian Moran, from Alexandria, is challenging McAuliffe in the Washington suburbs.
The victor will face former Virginia Attorney General Robert McDonnell, a Republican, in November.
The McAuliffe campaign did not offer further details on the former president’s planned appearances, except that he plans to focus on job creation and “why [McAuliffe] is the candidate best positioned to get Virginia’s economy back on track.”
“As a former governor and close friend of Terry’s, he’ll talk with Virginians about why Terry is best suited to turn Virginia’s economy around,” McAuliffe campaign manager Mike Henry said in a statement.
Bill Clinton donated $10,000 to McAuliffe’s campaign in January. Hillary Clinton, as secretary of state, is barred from campaigning or raising money under the Hatch Act.
