Former Gov. Jim Gilmore ekes out GOP nomination for U.S. senator from Virginia

RICHMOND

Former Gov. Jim Gilmore eked out the Republican nomination for the U.S. Senate at a state convention Saturday, surviving a contentious challenge from anti-abortion activists.

He edged out Del. Bob Marshall of Prince William County, the General Assembly’s most outspoken abortion foe, with 50.3 percent of the convention’s vote.

The victory puts Gilmore in a tough general election campaign against former Gov. Mark Warner, who is unopposed for the Democratic nomination and richly financed.

Gilmore withstood a strong tide from social conservatives and libertarians – many of them first-time convention goers – to push the GOP to the right and overhaul the party’s leadership.

An hour after the nomination, the 3,500 delegates ousted former Lt. Gov. John Hager as state party chairman. He was replaced by Del. Jeff Frederick of Prince William County, a 32-year-old who promised to sharpen the party’s conservative message and its technological prowess.

The GOP, once in firm control of state politics, has been chastened by a string of recent statewide defeats. Democrats have won the last two gubernatorial elections. They captured a U.S. Senate seat in 2006 when Democrat Jim Webb defeated Republican incumbent George Allen, and seized control of the state Senate last year.

At stake this year is the Senate seat Republican John Warner – no relation to Mark Warner – has held since 1979. The incumbent announced last summer that he would not seek re-election.

The convention was tense and businesslike. Marshall received chants of “Go, Bob, Go,” when he was speaking. There was no emotional outburst when Gilmore’s victory was announced, just polite applause.

Gilmore, 58, pledged to oppose additional taxes, cut federal spending and work to reduce gas prices by supporting new domestic drilling in Alaska and off the Atlantic coast.

“We are campaigning for regular people across the commonwealth of Virginia, working people that are looking for help, that are looking for someone to stand up for them,” Gilmore, the son of a Richmond butcher, said in his acceptance speech.

He turned up the heat on his long-simmering feud with Mark Warner over their different fiscal policies and political styles as governors. Gilmore served from 1998 to 2002 but could not seek re-election because Virginia is the only state that bars its chief executive from holding successive terms. Mark Warner succeeded him, serving from 2002 to 2006.

Gilmore, in his speech, said as governor he kept his major campaign promise to cut the car tax. In contrast, he noted that Warner made repeated pledges not to raise taxes during his 2002 campaign for governor and then ushered a record $1.4 billion increase through the legislature in 2004.

“Mark Warner is a big tax-and-spend liberal who says one thing and does something else,” Gilmore said.

Warner, who was not available for comment Saturday, has said he had to take urgent action as governor because Gilmore left behind a $6 billion state budget shortfall. He will reinforce that message this week with a television commercial that will run statewide. “We cleaned up the mess in Richmond, and now it’s time to clean up the mess in Washington,” Warner says in the ad. Gilmore’s first challenge will be uniting a Republican Party that has limited affection for him. Many Republican lawmakers have complained about his bruising, uncompromising style as governor.

Most of the convention drama was caused by Gilmore’s belief that abortion should be legal during the first two months of pregnancy. Marshall and his core supporters, who hope to outlaw abortion, said Gilmore’s position is untenable. “We cannot abandon one important principle to defeat Mark Warner,” Marshall said.

Marshall supporters also assailed Gilmore for increasing state spending during his governorship and for his current role as a director of Barr Pharmaceutical Inc., which manufactures Plan B, the so-called “morning-after” birth control pill that critics say is equivalent to a chemical abortion.

Marshall was strongest in his Northern Virginia home turf. He narrowly carried the 4th Congressional District, which includes Chesapeake and Suffolk. Gilmore decisively won the 2nd District, encompassing Virginia Beach and Norfolk; and the 3rd district which includes Portsmouth.

In a brief concession speech, Marshall never mentioned Gilmore by name or offered congratulations. In a subsequent interview, he said Gilmore will have a difficult time gaining the support of social conservatives.

“He’s got to run on the real principles of the party or he can’t win,” Marshall said.

Gilmore, in an interview, said he will not change his abortion stand. “This is a matter of belief,” he said. “It’s a belief I’ve had my entire public life.”

Warren Fiske, (804) 697-1565, warren.fiske@pilotonline.com