Virginia Beach attorney David McCormick announced his candidacy for the 2012 Republican nomination for the U.S. Senate on February 22, a date with significance for him because it is both George Washington’s birthday and the anniversary of the 1980 Olympic hockey game in which the underdog U.S. team defeated the team from the Soviet Union.

Two months after his announcement, the Charlottesville Libertarian Examiner caught up with McCormick at the 63rd annual Shad Planking in Wakefield, where he was trying to drum up support for his campaign among politically active Virginians.  Two of his opponents for the GOP nomination, George Allen and Jamie Radtke, were also shaking hands and posing for pictures there.

‘Business background’

McCormick said in an interview that he was motivated to run for the U.S. Senate seat being vacated by Democrat Jim Webb because he has “an incredibly strong business background” and he thinks “Washington absolutely needs to be run as a business. It takes people who have 25 years of leadership [but] who have not been politicians, that can make a difference and make the changes that our people deserve.”

McCormick’s business experience includes being a truck loader and driver for United Parcel Service, a company that also assigned him “to run nine operations in four cities,” where he trained “over a thousand people” in management and leadership skills.

Since becoming an attorney at age 38, McCormick said, he has served over 10,000 clients in the Hampton Roads area.  Many of these clients, he pointed out, were working-class and middle-class Virginians.

McCormick’s “number one” issue, he said, is “major reform of government” through downsizing, while “number two has to be the debt [and] deficit.”

Rising prices

He said that it is also necessary to “grow the economy” because voters are telling him that is their primary concern.

“I have actually met with 8,000 people conference-style, talking to them about issues of the day, that impacted them,” and among the topics that come up are rising food and energy prices.

“We’ve got to have better government policies to address those [issues] to help Virginians,” McCormick said.

Asked how he would appeal to libertarian voters, McCormick replied in general terms.

“I’m a very good case for a libertarian or an independent or a conservative,” he said.  “They’ll salute the fact that for 29 years I’ve worked with [the] middle class and working class of America.  I have such strong independent roots, even though I’m a strong Republican, very conservative on fiscal policy.”

‘Every solution’

He pointed out that he has “every policy, every solution on my web site” and suggested that “libertarians would love and support my candidacy.”

In the weeks to come, McCormick has campaign appearances scheduled in Norfolk and Williamsburg but he adds that “we’d be glad to make our case at meetings throughout the state of Virginia.”

As events are added to his schedule, McCormick said, they will be listed on his campaign’s web site.

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