Cheney Visited NC in 2003, 2004 for Burr Fundraisers

Will North Carolinians be seeing former Vice President Dick Cheney in the months ahead? That’s the question North Carolina Democrats are asking Senator Richard Burr (R-NC) after Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX), the chair of the National Republican Senatorial Committee, said he’d be “proud” to campaign with Cheney, “anywhere, anytime.”

According to the POLITICO newspaper, when asked if Cheney would make a good surrogate for Senate Republican candidates, Cornyn replied, “I think it depends on the circumstances on the race.”

In the wake of Cornyn’s response the North Carolina Democratic Party is calling on Richard Burr to answer a simple yes or no question. “Will you be inviting Dick Cheney to campaign with you?”

“Richard Burr invited Dick Cheney to North Carolina during his last campaign, and North Carolinians deserve to know if they’ll be seeing him again during this campaign,” said David Young, Chairman of the North Carolina Democratic Party. “Personally, I think Richard Burr should campaign with Dick Cheney. Burr was one of the best friends the Bush Administration had in the Senate, and he should use the opportunity to remind North Carolina voters of that fact.”

Cheney visited North Carolina in 2003 and 2004 for Burr’s first campaign for U.S. Senate, raising nearly half a million dollars. [Winston-Salem Journal, 5/18/04; AP, 9/12/03]  Burr voted with the Bush Administration 88% of the time.

Despite his lofty status as one of the Republican’s chief spokesmen, Cheney continues to be stunningly unpopular.  According to the Washington Post, the last four personal favorability ratings for Cheney: 37 percent, 18 percent, 19 percent and 30 percent.  Despite Cheney’s unpopularity, Cornyn and the NRSC are poised to unleash him in North Carolina and other battleground states across the country in 2010.