WASHINGTON – President Obama stumped Sunday for Democrat Terry McAuliffe in the Virginia governor’s race, making a last-minute appeal to “fire up” his party base to turn out for the Tuesday election.
“Are you fired up,” boomed Obama, reprising the rally call from his presidential runs as he whipped up about 1,600 people at a high school in DC’s Virginia suburbs.
“We cannot have people stay at home when so much is at stake,” he said. “Nothing makes me more nervous than when my supporters start feeling too confident, so I want to put the fear of God in all of you.”
Polls show McAuliffe with a comfortable lead over Republican Ken Cuccinelli, the Viginia attorney general.
But turnout is expected to be a critical factor, and Cuccinelli has gained some 11th hour traction by running against ObamaCare.
The national parties are fighting hard for the bragging rights in the Virginia race.
Obama flipped the previously reliably red state blue in 2008 and 2012.
During that time, Virginia voters elected the current governor, Republican Bob McDonnell, by 59 percent in 2009.
McAuliffe, former chairman of the Democratic National Committee and a close ally of the Clintons, also has had President Clinton and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton stump for him.
Vice President Joe Biden hits the campaign trail for him Monday.
In the final stretch of the campaign, Cuccinelli is being boosted on the stump by GOP heavyweights Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker, Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida and former Rep. Ron Paul of Texas.
Cuccinelli has made ObamaCare a key issue in the final days of the race, tapping voter anger over the Obama administration’s botched rollout of the law.
Obama didn’t mention the health care law. Instead, he tried to link Cuccinelli to Tea Party Republicans, who he blamed for the government shutdown last month.
“You’ve seen an extreme faction of the Republican Party that has shown again and again and again that they’re willing to hijack their party, the country, and the economy … if they don’t get 100 percent of what they want,” Obama said in the 21-minute speech.
“Here in Virginia you felt the pain of the first government shutdown in 17 years and there aren’t a lot of states that felt more of the pain than folks right here in Virginia,” he said.
“You cannot afford to have a governor who’s thinking the same way,” Obama said. “The governor, that’s a practical job.… They can’t afford to be to be ideologues, they’ve got to be able work with everybody and compromise and get the job done.”