From the Democratic Party of Virginia:
Yesterday The Run 2016 reported that a host of national Tea Party figures, including Senators Rand Paul and Marco Rubio, plan to campaign with Ken Cuccinelli in the near future.
Tea Party candidates campaigning for Tea Party candidates may not seem remarkable on the face of it, but Paul and Rubio’s impending campaign events for Cuccinelli raise a couple interesting questions about the agenda that Cuccinelli would bring to the Governor’s mansion if elected.
No state has been more affected by the damaging federal “sequester” defense cuts than Virginia, where the Department of Defense and the federal government drive a substantial portion of the state’s economic activity. Senator Paul actually supports damaging defense cuts and has argued that they should have been even deeper.
Is Paul eager to come to Virginia for Cuccinelli because of their shared hostility toward economic growth that involves the federal government? Just as Paul believes cutting government is more important than growing the economy, Cuccinelli is on the record saying that economic growth in Virginia that involves the federal government is “not good.”
Marco Rubio’s impending visit to campaign with Cuccinelli raises different questions about the Attorney General’s agenda. Rubio’s crowning achievement so far in the U.S. Senate is immigration reform legislation that includes a pathway to citizenship for undocumented immigrants.
Cuccinelli has a long record supporting (and advancing) draconian policies targeted at Virginia immigrants, including his legislation that would have allowed employers to fire people who speak a language other than English on the job. He has consistently opposed the pathway to citizenship that Rubio helped push through the U.S. Senate, even if he’s tried to mask that position recently in an effort to appear more moderate than he is.
Reaching out to Paul, Rubio and other DC Tea Party superstars to help his campaign is proof that Cuccinelli is having trouble energizing his base. It also gives Virginians a clear look into an agenda that is right in line with (or even more extreme than) what divisive Tea Party extremists are working on everyday in Congress.
Background:
Argued Economic Growth in Northern Virginia was “Not Good” because it was Reliant on Federal Government
In July 2010, Cuccinelli answered a question in an online forum criticizing economic growth in Northern Virginia largely based on federal employment.
Arlington, VA: How would you say the culture and politics of Northern Virginia has changed since you grew up here?
Ken Cuccinelli: A couple of points here: 1) we've become much more diverse with the influx of people from all over the world. 2) we've also gotten bigger (more people), which is great insofar as our local economy has grown, unfortunately a big chunk of that growth has been driven by a massively growing federal government… and that's not good. [Washington Post, 7/30/10]
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