Jim McKelvey is seeking the Republican party’s nomination in the Fifth Congressional District of Virginia, where he hopes to challenge incumbent Democrat Tom Perriello in November’s general election. There are six other candidates in the June 8th GOP primary.

The Fifth District is generally Republican-leaning. Perriello defeated his predecessor, Virgil Goode, by fewer than 750 votes in 2008, when he had the advantage of being on the same ticket as Barack Obama, who became the first Democratic presidential candidate since Lyndon Johnson in 1964 to carry Virginia.

Earlier this month, when Charlottesville Republicans had a mass meeting to elect a new unit chair and select delegates to attend the Fifth District convention, McKelvey was there to promote his campaign. He answered a few questions from the Charlottesville Libertarian Examiner.

McKelvey described himself as a businessman who owns “seven different companies, mainly oriented around real estate, but [also] construction, excavation, land development, commercial, residential, car wash, many things,” he said. “I keep busy.”

Three Top Issues

Asked what his three top issues will be in the general election campaign, McKelvey listed them succinctly:

“Reducing the size of the federal government; radically changing the tax system; which is the fair tax; and dealing with the illegal immigration problem, which is coupled with national security. Those are the items.”

Uniting the Party

With a primary field of seven Republican candidates, McKelvey will be tasked with unifying the party should he win the nomination. His strategy for doing so, he said, is to “stand by my principles. It’s that simple. I will not deviate from my principles. My votes are not for sale. I’m going to do what’s best for the country. I’m going to restore the Constitution – period. And that [the other candidates] should be able to stand behind.”

In response to a question about how to deal with the different types of Republicans – social conservatives, fiscal conservatives, libertarians, and Club for Growth types, among others – McKelvey said the best way to bring them all together to pursue the common goal of winning back Perriello’s seat is to “educate them as to why the country is going broke and why, if we don’t do some radical changes and do them soon, we will no longer have a republic to live in.”

Control the Spending

McKelvey explained:

“We’ve got to get control of the deficit and get control of the spending. How do you do that? You crunch numbers. I’ll go door to door, 434 of the doors to explain it to every congressman there.”

The candidate also predicted a major shift in control of the federal legislative branch.

“I see a historic flip in Congress come November of this year. I’m anticipating over 100 seats flip[ping].”

When that happens, he said, “the day after the election, we get all the freshmen congressman together, unify them, get an agenda, and when we hit the floor in January, I want to see bills written so we can get really moving quick because that window of opportunity will remain small.”

Suggesting the urgency of the situation, McKelvey concluded:

“We need to get it done, and get it done now.”

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