McAuliffe: "I'm on a multi-faceted campaign"

Fairfax County businessman, 2009 gubernatorial candidate and former DNC chairman Terry McAuliffe brought his green ideas to Culpeper Wednesday as a speaker at Germanna Community College’s Greenforce Initiative. But before he talked about the pressing need for Virginia to establish a renewable energy standard, he stopped by the Star-Exponent to talk politics.

Though unsuccessful in the ’09 Democratic primary for governor, McAuliffe — who has since created an electric car company and hopes to reopen a shuttered paper plant in Franklin as a biomass operation — did not rule out a future run for the state’s top spot.

“I am certainly thinking about it, but that’s three years away,” he said. “If I think I can make a difference, I would be interested. As governor you can really make a difference; you can turbo charge investments to bring business in. If I did anything, that’s what I would be interested in.”

McAuliffe, chairman of McLean-based GreenTech Automotive, said he is not interested in running for Jim Webb’s senate seat in 2012.

“I’ve been pretty clear on it — I’m much more of an executive. I like to make a decision today and have it be implemented tomorrow,” he said.

McAuliffe said he hoped former Gov. Tim Kaine would seek Webb’s seat. He also threw his support behind President Barack Obama, saying Republicans don’t have a chance of winning back the Oval Office.

“Nobody’s going to beat President Obama. He’s going to win reelection,” McAuliffe predicted, adding that GOP candidates ran on a lot of rhetoric in last year’s congressional races.

“They don’t have a coherent message and who’s going to run against him? Who have they got?”

He said 2012 could be a banner year for Democrats, while lamenting his party’s “dismal messaging” in the last election. Obama’s successes in office should have been the message, McAuliffe said, mentioning healthcare, saving the auto industry and following through on President Bush’s bank bailout. He said the banks and car companies have paid back the government fully or in some part — and with interest.

“All the Republicans said was no. They didn’t come up with any alternatives or ideas,” McAuliffe said. “At the end of it, Obama did a great job.”

The economy is getting better, he said, but the fact remains that the country is carrying too much debt. McAuliffe, a friend of Bill Clinton, said the federal government also needs to do a better job of controlling spending. Going forward, he said, America needs to create new technologies so as to create jobs.

“We have to do a better job of aggressively going after businesses to entice them,” McAuliffe said.

The state of Mississippi enticed him to build an electric car plant there by offering free land and tax incentives, he said. The plant, which is expected to complete its first car July 4, will create 1,000 jobs. McAuliffe said he will announce a second plant opening later this year that will create thousands more.

But there is little time to waste if America wants to lead the industry.

“China just announced that they want to own the electric car market,” he said. ‘If we here in America give up one more business to China …,” McAuliffe said, trailing off, reiterating his point about getting out in front of new technologies.

“It’s about jobs. It’s also about national security. We can’t be importing 70 percent of our oil from foreign governments — many of them that don’t like us.”

Speaking about state government, he doubted the sustainability of Gov. Bob McDonnell’s plan to borrow $4 billion to fund transportation improvements.

According to McAuliffe, there is no plan to pay it back.

“The Tea Party Express ought to be rolling the train straight through the General Assembly and the governor’s office” in protest, McAuliffe said. “Kicking the can down the road to the next administration, I don’t think is great fiscal stewardship and issuing press releases to say we’re doing a great job in not raising your taxes, well, be very careful because you might be raising our taxes.”

Clearly a man on a mission, McAuliffe — who has a wife and five kids, aged 8 to 20 — darted from the newspaper interview to a lunch meeting at Thai Culpeper with Culpeper County Board Chairman Bill Chase before speaking at the green summit at GCC.

Wednesday night, he flew to Geneva, Switzerland to speak at another green technology conference, and planned to be back in Virginia by Friday for the Democratic Party of Virginia’s Jefferson Jackson Dinner in Richmond.

McAuliffe returns to Culpeper Feb. 23 to meet with the Culpeper County Democratic Committee for its 7 p.m. meeting downtown.

But he says he not’s running for office — yet.

“I’m not asking for any support,” McAuliffe said, asked about how much political backing he has in the Virginia Piedmont. “We are on a multi-faceted campaign for green technologies. It all works together.”