David McCormick worked his way up the ladder at UPS, started law school in his 30s and his own law firm at 38. He knows uphill battles. Competing against former governor and U.S. senator George Allen for the Republican Senate nomination is just another one.
“Both parties are to blame. We’re at the very brink of bankruptcy,” said McCormick, who “understands bankruptcies very well” from his years in bankruptcy law.
“I’ve done 8,000 budgets, and I know how to take a look and solve a problem. And I’m one that will never kick the can down the road,” McCormick said.
McCormick has put together detailed budget, jobs and national-security plans to propose concrete solutions. He said his jobs plan will add 10 to 20 million jobs to the American economy over the next five to eight years, with a focus on re-establishing a manufacturing base Stateside through the creation of tax-free zones, tax reform and federal tort reform.
His national-security plan is highlighted by an emphasis on the creation of a missile-defense system. “North Korea and Iran will probably have the nuclear capability soon of striking in a short-, medium- and long-range term. “We need that shield of protection,” said McCormick, citing former president Ronald Reagan.
“I’m very serious about this, and I don’t think the conversation is there in Washington,” McCormick said.
To McCormick, it will take a political outsider to shake up the Washington culture.
“We’re at a point in time where both parties recognize that if we don’t make serious changes, if we don’t change the course of business and dialogue in politics, we’re going to lose something very special in our nation – our liberties, our freedoms, what makes us very real,” McCormick said.
McCormick said he wants to salute the work of Allen in public service over the years, but he believes it’s time for a “new generation of leaders to take charge.”
“The type of senator I would be is a strong conservative Republican that’s fiercely independent.”