Terry McAuliffe’s GreenTech involved in pay-for-play visa shenanigans?

[Valin]

Red State:

 

Moe Lane

April 11th, 2013

 

Jim Geraghty over at NRO has an absolutely must-read story about a really problematic – for Terry McAuliffe, current* Democratic nominee for governor in Virginia – story about GreenTech Automotive. For those who don’t remember, GreenTech is the electric glorified golf cart car company that McAuliffe loudly trumpeted as being part of his job-creation record… and quietly divested from, without telling anybody thad he had. This was a bit interesting, given that McAuliffe’s candidacy is based around his business experience; so there was an expectation that another shoe was due to drop.

 

(Snip)

 

It all comes back to the EB-5 visa program (mentioned earlier here): for those who don’t remember, this is a program that basically sells green cards to people with lots of spare cash – and who are willing to spend some of it investing in the USA . The problem is that nobody’s really supposed to be that blunt about it**; an added wrinkle is that the program tends to attract investors whose money might perhaps be a bit, ah, problematical. Which is a polite way of saying “we’re selling visas to people who largely have made their money off of Chinese sweatshops.” And before you accuse me of being a partisan hack… yeah, I am. I’m the worst kind, in fact: the kind who happens to be right. Jim quotes Liz Povar, business director of the Virginia Economic Development Corporation under Tim Kaine:

 

(Snip)

 

* Not “beleaguered” – yet. Not “endangered” – yet. Not yet “embattled” – although that might change, now that sites like National Journal (via @TheRickWilson) are actively calling into question McAuliffe’s business qualifications. But Terry McAuliffe’s raison d’être is business experience. “Giving them the business” is not the same thing.

 

 

 

 

H/T NRO's Three Martini Lunch