AMAC Exclusive – By Seamus Brennan
If recent polling indicates anything about the current state of the Virginia gubernatorial race, it’s that many Virginians don’t need any more reasons to oppose Democrat candidate Terry McAuliffe than they already have. Between his covert support for Critical Race Theory, discreet plans to abolish the suburbs, advocacy for abortion-on-demand, and other radical policies, it has become increasingly clear that McAuliffe’s alliance with the far-left wing of his party is, at the very least, alarming to the people of the Commonwealth of Virginia.
But McAuliffe’s utter lack of political appeal does not end there: for decades, Terry McAuliffe has been engaged in a persistent pattern of shady political practices, sketchy business dealings, and strange personal behaviors. Here are just five of the most prominent examples that Virginians should not forget when they head to the ballot box.
McAuliffe Was A Bag Man for the Clinton Money Machine
As the co-chairman of President Bill Clinton’s 1996 reelection campaign, McAuliffe was involved in several fundraising scandals that led even the Democrat-friendly New York Times to chastise him as “a walking symbol of the wretched excess of the Clinton years.” McAuliffe was reportedly involved in a scheme to allow “major financial supporters be treated to time with President Clinton at breakfasts, lunches, coffees, morning jogs, or golf”—including so-called “overnights” in the Lincoln Bedroom. Some Democrats were appalled by the sale of access to the White House for fundraising purposes. Republican Chairman Dan Burton of the House Committee on Government Reform and Oversight said the arrangement amounted to selling “access to places like the Lincoln bedroom for political contributions.” In total, Clinton’s team hosted more than 100 “coffees” and 49 “overnights” at the White House, which together raised more than $30 million for Clinton’s reelection efforts.
McAuliffe Helped Chinese Nationals Acquire U.S. Visas in Return for Investments in his Company
Following his unsuccessful first bid for the Governor’s Mansion in 2009, McAuliffe founded GreenTech, an electric car manufacturer through which he would use his political connections to solicit investments from the United States federal government, the Commonwealth of Virginia, and Chinese nationals. GreenTech, along with Gulf Coast Funds Management (led by Hillary Clinton’s late brother Anthony Rodham), drew in $7.5 million in investments, which in turn allowed Chinese nationals to secure U.S. visas—a ploy derided as a “visas-for-sale scheme” with potentially grave “national security implications.” McAuliffe and Rodham went on to lobby then-Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano to grant visas to Chinese investors who met the EB-5 threshold of $500,000. A 30-minute film detailing the scandal was released by Citizens United.
McAuliffe Was Investigated by the FBI for Possible Illegal Campaign Contributions & Donated Nearly $500,000 to Disgraced Former FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe’s Wife’s Campaign At a Time When McCabe was Investigating McAuliffe Political Patron Hillary Clinton
In 2016, the FBI opened an investigation into whether then-Governor McAuliffe accepted illegal campaign contributions from American companies owned by Wang Wenliang, a Chinese billionaire and politician. Though McAuliffe at first denied ever meeting Wenliang, he later conceded that they had in fact crossed paths: “They say he may have come to the inaugural, not sure. We may have had him over for a cup of coffee with the Secretary of Agriculture,” he said. Wenliang attended a 2013 fundraiser for the Clinton Foundation, for which McAuliffe at one point served on the board of directors, and later donated $2 million to the organization.
Also in 2016, as reported by the Wall Street Journal, McAuliffe’s PAC “gave nearly $500,000 to the election campaign of” Democrat Jill McCabe, a former candidate for the Virginia state senate and husband of then-FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe, “who later helped oversee the investigation into Mrs. Clinton’s email use.” This appearance of impropriety led the Justice Department to investigate whether McCabe should have recused himself from the Clinton email server investigation.
McAuliffe Used Insider Connections to Cash Out His Shares of a Company Before It Crashed
When Global Crossing’s stock peaked in 1999—two years after McAuliffe had invested $100,000 in the fiber-optic company—he immediately sold his shares and walked away with an $8 million profit. As PolitiFact put it, “McAuliffe made a fantastic profit through an insider deal that allowed him to buy Global Crossing stock before it was offered to the public.” In 2002, however, the group’s stock plummeted and the company went into bankruptcy, causing more than 3,000 employees to lose their jobs. In a 2013 ad, one former Global Crossing employee said she “lost all [her] severance, lost all the money in [her] 401k,” while another said she “got walked out” and that her “career was over.”
This pattern of unseemly business dealings continued with McAuliffe’s involvement with Telergy, a Syracuse-based company he joined in 1999 as a member of its Board of Directors. According to The Roanoke Times, “[at] McAuliffe’s urging, Global Crossing invested $40 million in Telergy,” for which the firm later paid McAuliffe “$1.2 million for his help in raising money for the company.” Yet, two years later, just weeks after McAuliffe had resigned from the board, Telergy “was forced to lay off 150 employees without giving them any severance pay.” Months later, Telergy was bankrupt.
McAuliffe Left His Wife Behind on the Day of His Child’s Birth—Twice
According to McAuliffe’s 2008 memoir, he left his wife in the hospital as she was giving birth to their daughter Sarah to attend a party thrown by the Washington Post – a move that raises questions among Republicans, Democrats, and feminists. If that decision wasn’t troubling enough, McAuliffe also admitted to leaving his wife and newborn son Justin in the car so he could stop into a fundraising dinner for “maybe fifteen minutes.” “I felt bad for Dorothy,” he wrote, “but it was a million bucks for the Democratic Party.”
By now, many Virginians likely know better than to lend their support to a candidate who has openly established himself as a self-serving and unprincipled political operator who will do or say anything to achieve or maintain political power. Terry McAuliffe’s career is embodied by ‘the swamp’—a truth that is becoming clearer and clearer as his campaign and his image continue to falter.
The McAuliffe campaign and other Democrats are reportedly in a serious state of worry and panic as McAuliffe’s Republican opponent Glenn Youngkin continues to surge in polls. But it is McAuliffe himself—not Youngkin—who may prove to be the campaign’s greatest enemy.
