Terry McAuliffe

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Terry McAuliffe

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Terence Richard "Terry" McAuliffe (b. February 9, 1957) is an American businessman and political consultant. He served as chairman of the Democratic National Committee (DNC) from 2001-05. He currently serves as chairman of the Hillary Clinton for President committee.

1 Biography
- 1.1 Family and education
- 1.2 Politics
2 Controversies
- 2.1 Global Crossing
- 2.2 Herman v. Moore
3 References
4 External links

[edit] Biography

[edit] Family and education

McAuliffe grew up in Syracuse, New York and graduated from Bishop Ludden Junior/Senior High School in 1975. His father was treasurer of the local Democratic organization.^[1] He started his first business, McAuliffe Driveway Maintenance, at the age of 14. In 1979, he received a bachelors degree from Catholic University in Washington, D.C. After graduation, McAuliffe took a job in the 1980 presidential reelection campaign of Jimmy Carter. After the campaign, McAuliffe enrolled in law school at Georgetown University. He received a Juris Doctor degree in 1984.^[2]

McAuliffe served as Chairman of the Federal City National Bank by the age of 30. He has successfully started more than two-dozen companies in the fields of banking, insurance, marketing and real estate.

McAuliffe lives in McLean, Virginia, with his wife Dorothy and five children.

[edit] Politics

From 1985-87, McAuliffe served as finance director of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee. During the 1988 presidential campaign, he served as finance chairman for Dick Gephardt. During the 1996 election cycle, he served as national finance chairman and then national co-chairman of the Clinton-Gore re-election committee.^[3] In 1997, he was chairman of the 53rd Presidential Inaugural Committee.^[4] In 1999 he was chairman of the White House Millennium Celebration.^[5]

In 2000, McAuliffe chaired a tribute to outgoing President Bill Clinton, which set a fundraising record for a single event.^[6] The same year, he chaired the Democratic National Convention in Los Angeles.^[7] Following the convention, the Democratic ticket received a significant bounce in the polls.^[8] In February 2001, McAuliffe was elected as the chairman of the DNC. McAuliffe served until February 2005, presiding over a period of record fundraising wherein the DNC raised more than $535 million, outraising the RNC and emerging from debt for the first time in party history. McAuliffe built a new headquarters and created a computer database of more than 170 million potential voters known as "Demzilla".^[9]

Under his tenure, the Democrats lost House and Senate seats in the 2002 and 2004 Congressional elections, while their Democratic nominee narrowly lost the 2004 presidential election. In 2002, McAuliffe drew some controversy when he announced that he would not channel funds towards Carl McCall's campaign for Governor of New York. Congressman Charles B. Rangel protested that this would alienate the black vote and McAuliffe reversed himself.[1] McCall was defeated by a large margin by incumbent George Pataki.

McAuliffe stepped down as DNC chair in January 2005. As a former party chairman, McAuliffe is one of the roughly 796 superdelegates to the 2008 Democratic National Convention. He is the chair of Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign.

On January 23, 2007, his book, What A Party! My Life Among Democrats: Presidents, Candidates, Donors, Activists, Alligators, and Other Wild Animals, was released and debuted at #5 on the New York Times Bestseller list and #1 on the Washington Post's list.

[edit] Controversies

[edit] Global Crossing

McAuliffe has been criticized by political commentators such as William Safire ^[10] and Arianna Huffington ^[11] for his ties to Global Crossing, a company that went bankrupt in 2002^[12] amidst what The New York Times called "many of the same accusations that have made Enron into one of the largest corporate scandals in history."^[13]

In 1997, McAuliffe purchased a pre-IPO $100,000 stake in Global Crossing. By 1999, McAuliffe sold his investment, which was then valued at $18 million dollars. Howard Kurtz of CNN reported that McAuliffe sold his shares years before there was "any hint of trouble with the company" thus clearing him of any wrongdoing.^[14]

In March 2004, former Global Crossing executives paid $325 million without acknowledgment of wrongdoing to settle a class-action lawsuit alleging fraud. In April 2005, former executives agreed to pay fines for failing to disclose "material information" in the company's financial reports, settling a three-year inquiry by the Security and Exchange Commission.^[15]

Rick Perlstein, in his book review of McAuliffe's memoir, What a Party!, wrote that McAuliffe's involvement with Global Crossing compromised McAuliffe's ability to attack Republican ties to the Enron scandal during the 2002 midterm congressional elections. Republicans ended up winning a majority in the U.S. Senate. ^[16] Frank Rich of The New York Times contrasted McAuliffe's characterization of Enron as "a web of greed and deceit" with McAuliffe's defense of his investment in Global Crossing.^[17]

[edit] Herman v. Moore

In 1999, the U.S. Department of Labor sued Jack Moore, pension fund manager for the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, on the basis of several deals made with McAuliffe. In one deal, McAuliffe and the pension fund partnered to buy commercial property in Florida, with McAuliffe investing $100 while the pension fund put up $39 million. McAuliffe received a 50% interest in the partnership and emerged with $2.45 million from his original $100 investment. The lawsuit was called Herman v. Moore, with Alexis Herman, the Secretary of Labor, as the plaintiff. In October 2001, Moore and another union official agreed to pay six-figure penalties for their roles in the deals and the union agreed to reimburse the pension fund. McAuliffe was not charged with wrongdoing.[2][3][4]