Virginia’s contest for U.S. Senate was supposed to be the
marquee rematch of the 2012 election cycle: former Sen. George
Allen vying to unseat the man who narrowly toppled him six years
before, Sen. Jim Webb. Cowboy boots versus combat boots all over
again.
But the rematch isn’t happening because one of those 2006
combatants won’t be on the ballot. Webb decided against running for
reelection. There’s no guarantee Allen will be in contention next
November either. Tea Party activist Jamie Radtke and Bishop E.W.
Jackson are two likely primary opponents. Prince William County
Board of Supervisors chairman Corey Stewart, Congressman Rob
Wittman, and Del. Bob Marshall are also taking a look at the
race.
Allen nevertheless sounds confident and upbeat. Despite missteps
in his own campaign — particularly the “Macaca” moment reported ad
nauseam by the Washington Post — and a disastrous year
for Republicans in general, Allen lost by just 7,200 votes. Since
2006, the state political climate for Republicans has improved
dramatically. If his campaign improves half as much, Allen would
have to be the prohibitive favorite. He’d be running without George
W. Bush, Iraq, or an unconventional opponent like Webb.
This time around, the albatrosses would mostly hang around the
Democrat’s neck: high unemployment, massive budget deficits,
burgeoning debt, and an unpopular health care reform law. After a
stint with the Democratic National Committee, former Gov. Tim Kaine
doesn’t look as post-partisan as he did in 2005 (though national
Democrats still consider him the strongest candidate). Public
Policy Polling, a Democratic firm, shows Kaine and Allen in a dead
heat.
So the big question for Virginia Republicans is whether Allen
remains their best standard-bearer for Senate. “I don’t like to
lose,” he told TAS. “But it is a humbling experience and
you can learn from it.” Allen continues, “I take responsibility for
the mistakes in my [2006] campaign.”
It was only the second loss of Allen’s political career. The son
of the legendary Washington Redskins coach, Allen finished third
out of four candidates in a 1979 bid for the Virginia House of
Delegates — his campaign manager reportedly made him wear wingtips
instead of his trademark cowboy boots — but went on to be elected
delegate, congressman, and governor. In 2000, Allen was the only
Republican challenger to beat a sitting Democratic senator.
Running to regain that seat, Allen rails against excessive
federal spending. He calls for a balanced budget amendment to the
Constitution, supermajorities for earmarks, and a line-item veto.
If Congress fails to pass a budget, like the Democratic majority
did last year, Allen would dock members’ pay. Allen favors
repealing President Obama’s Affordable Care Act and points out that
he — along with then-Sen. John Warner — recommended Henry Hudson,
the Virginia jurist who ruled Obamacare unconstitutional, for his
current federal judgeship.
Overall, Allen argues that the Tea Party is pushing Virginia and
the country back to “common sense conservatism”: energy
independence and a limited federal government that focuses on its
main constitutional responsibility, national defense. He believes
he is a good fit for the commonwealth’s recent rightward shift.
Asked if he thought Republicans did a good job controlling
federal spending the last time they were in the majority, Allen
isn’t quite as enthusiastic as when he criticized the Democrats but
still readily concedes they did not. “I was against overspending
then too,” he says. Allen emphasizes that he opposed the Troubled
Assets Relief Program (TARP) when it was conceived to bail out Wall
Street — he was no longer in the Senate when it passed — and also
against the Obama administration’s decision to use TARP funds to
bail out automobile manufacturers.
Still, Allen’s Bush-era record is going to come under heavy
scrutiny from his likely primary opponents. “The Tea Party movement
would not exist today if the Republicans had not failed under the
Bush years,” Jamie Radtke said at the inaugural meeting of the
Senate Tea Party caucus. Corey Stewart uncorked the following in a
television interview: “Sen. Allen was a great governor of Virginia
— he really was. But his record in the United States Senate was
mediocre.” (Allen does prefer to be addressed as “Governor
Allen.”)
Among Virginia Republicans, the battle lines are already drawn:
on the one side there are those who believe George Allen was a Tea
Party conservative before it was cool. On the other are those who
want him to join his rivals Jim Webb and Chuck Robb in
retirement.
