Perriello enters race for 5th seat

Bob Gibson / Charlottesville Daily Progress
Published: October 6, 2007

Tom Perriello has worked in Afghanistan, Sierra Leone and the Sudan and now is seeking a job in Washington.

A leader in the progressive religious movement, the Albemarle County native with two degrees from Yale has set his sights on the 5th District seat in Congress firmly held for the past 11 years by Rep. Virgil H. Goode Jr., R-Rocky Mount.

The son of a prominent local pediatrician, Vito Perriello, he is more likely to talk about "the difference between right and wrong than the difference between right and left."

He is at home discussing the values of faith and family and decries what he called "the decline of our culture into a culture of instant gratification and greed."

A Catholic who admires the leadership of retired Bishop Walter Sullivan, Perriello said his international experience translates well in Virginia.

"You can't help people locally unless you understand what's going on around the world, whether it's gas prices or our security," he said.

Perriello, who turns 33 on Tuesday, is one of three Democrats seeking a May nomination to challenge Goode in 2008. The other hopefuls are historian David Shreve, also of Albemarle, and Brydon Jackson, a former state trooper and Chatham businessman.

Goode could not be reached for comment.

Former Del. Mitchell Van Yahres, a Charlottesville Democrat, helped Perriello into his first political job about 19 years ago when the delegate found him a position as a page in the House of Delegates.

"He was a very good page. He's darn smart," said Van Yahres, who is impressed with Perriello's dedication since law school to working on justice and security strategies in Afghanistan, as well as helping prosecute warlords in Sierra Leone and developing alternative peace plans in the Darfur region of the Sudan.

Van Yahres said he is very impressed with the intensity and energy that Perriello has put into organizing social justice groups and his fundraising prowess as a congressional hopeful.

A member of the candidate's campaign steering committee, Van Yahres said Perriello has jumped into the lead in fundraising among the Democrats by taking in $109,500 in campaign contributions in his first four weeks as a candidate.

Shreve said he is close to $20,000 in campaign cash raised to date and Jackson apparently has not yet crossed the $5,000 threshold that requires a candidate to file with the Federal Election Commission.

Fred Hudson, Albemarle County and 5th District Democratic chairman, said he is delighted to see the competition and happy to find a candidate from the faith community willing to challenge Goode.

Perriello has co-founded a number of progressive faith-based groups, including darfurgenocide.org, that promote peace with social justice.

In Afghanistan, where he worked this summer and for three months in 2005, a "toxic combination of corruption, incompetence and complicity with warlords" and drug networks has created a huge gap between the Afghan people and the government, a gap the anti-government insurgency is exploiting, he said.

Instead of working through corrupt warlords and "guys whose authority comes only from the gun," Americans should be working to deny the Taliban insurgency the hearts and minds of the Afghan people, who are looking for security, stability and social justice, he said.

This translates into Virginia's politics because "we simply cannot think locally without thinking globally," Perriello said. This area can lead on the world stage in energy independence and fighting for the politics of the common good, he said.

"We know here what it means to sacrifice for the common good, to believe that the challenge to love your neighbor, to watch your neighbor's back, is a real moral challenge," he said. "That means that Danville has got to believe that Charlottesville is its neighbor and care for it, and Charlottesville has to care for Danville and every town in between."

Over the next three months, Perriello said, he plans to spend a day in every county in the 5th District. He said he will be one Democrat carrying a message of faith in "the common good for the commonwealth."

As for getting the nomination and defeating Goode, Van Yahres said the candidate "understands the realistic aspects of this whole campaign that it's going to be very difficult."