Politics

Allen Enters Va. Senate Race

April 13, 1999 / 1:13 PM EDT / AP

Saying he would work for "a stronger, safer and freer America," former Gov. George Allen announced Tuesday that he would seek the Republican nomination to oppose Democratic Sen. Charles S. Robb in 2000.

A race between the two men would be closely watched nationwide as Republicans try to keep their majority in the Senate. Polls conducted on the premise that Allen would oppose Robb have consistently shown the challenger with a lead.

"Folks have told me they want Senator John Warner to have a principled and vigorous partner in his dedicated work for a stronger, safer and freer America," Allen said in a statement. Warner, Virginia's senior senator, is also a Republican.

Allen, 47, who often describes himself as a "Jeffersonian conservative," chose the 256th anniversary of Thomas Jefferson's birth to announce his bid.

Robb, in his second term in the Senate, has not yet said whether he will seek re-election. But like Allen, he has been raising money for the race. No other Republican has expressed interest in opposing Robb.

Last December, after finishing his four-year term as governor, Allen formed a committee to explore his chances of winning a race against Robb, who barely survived a Republican challenge in 1994 from Iran-Contra figure Oliver North.

Allen, the namesake son of the famed Washington Redskins and Los Angeles Rams football coach, led this decade's Republican resurgence in Virginia. When he left office, barred by state law from seeking a second term, 62 percent of people responding to a poll said he had done an excellent or good job as governor.

Allen's political acumen was largely underestimated before his come-from-behind victory over state Attorney General Mary Sue Terry in the 1993 governor's race. Although he had served in the House of Delegates for nine years and in Congress for 14 months, he was not well known outside his Charlottesville-area base.

But he led a folksy, conservative campaign, promising to abolish the "liberal, lenient parole system," and succeeded in ending a 12-year Democratic hold on the governorship.

Robb, the 59-year-old son-in-law of the late President Lyndon B. Johnson, was credited with bringing about a Democratic revival in Virginia in the 1980s following three successive Republican governors.

He was elected to the Senate in 1988. He is the only Democrat holding statewide elected office in Virginia.