Obama Heads to Va. With No Welcome from GOP

By JEFF E. SCHAPIRO and NEIL H. SIMON

Media General News Service
Published: June 5, 2008

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WASHINGTON- With Sen. Barack Obama set to campaign Thursday in rural and suburban Virginia, Republicans downplayed the presumptive Democratic nominee’s chances in the state in November.

Obama plans a town hall event Thursday in Bristol, on the edge of the Southwest Virginia coalfields. He then is to host a rally at the Nissan Pavilion, which holds 25,000 people, in suburban Prince William County, 35 miles from Washington.

Sen. John McCain’s Virginia campaign cochairmen said on a conference call with reporters that Obama’s past comment about “bitter” rural Americans who “cling to guns and religion” will come back to haunt him in Southwest Virginia.

“I think a lot of rural Americans will remember that,“ said former Virginia Attorney General Jerry Kilgore.

Obama beat Hillary Clinton 64 percent to 36 percent in the Virginia primary Feb. 12.

Obama’s supporters said rural voters just need to get to know Obama.

“We begin the process tomorrow of acquainting Southwest Virginians with him in a very personal way,“ said Rep. Rick Boucher, D-9th.

Boucher pointed to Obama’s support for rural broadband access, telemedicine technology and health and water issues as reasons small-town Americans will support his candidacy.

Former Gov. Mark R. Warner, the presumptive Democratic nominee for U.S. Senate, who had remained silent through the primary, will join Obama in Bristol.

Del. Christopher Saxman, R-Staunton, said the itinerary shows the senator from Illinois is heading where his support has been lacking—Appalachia.

He said Obama’s views can be summed in three lines: “‘I don’t like guns. I’m going to raise your taxes. I don’t like coal.‘ That’s a tough sell in Virginia.“

Obama campaign spokeswoman Amy Brundage said Virginia would be “critical” to winning in November.

“We intend to spend time talking to voters about what is at stake in this election - four more years of the failed Bush policies that John McCain is offering, or real change that will end the war in Iraq, strengthen the economy and bring affordable health care for all Americans,“ she said in a statement.

McCain plans to hold a fund-raiser Monday in Richmond.

In another development, Jim Leaman, president of the 200,000-member Virginia AFL-CIO, became the latest state superdelegate to back Obama. Three of Virginia’s 17 superdelegates remain uncommitted.

An aide to Democratic Sen. Jim Webb, a Virginia superdelegate, said the senator would not offer any endorsements Wednesday. The aide said it was unknown whether Webb would attend Obama’s Virginia events.

(Contact Jeff E. Schapiro at or Neil H. Simon at .)