Clinton Friend Gets Top DNC Job

Feb. 4 -- Democratic National Committee chairman Terry McAuliffe, having vowed to make his party more aggressive, is keeping up the tough talk a day after being elected.

"You've got to start with a bang," McAuliffe said today on NBC's Meet the Press, referring to his acceptance speech at the party's conference in Washington, during which he questioned the legitimacy of President George W. Bush's electoral victory. "At the end of the day if all the votes were counted in Florida, Al Gore would be president today and George Bush would be back in Austin."

On Saturday, McAuliffe promised to challenge the Bush White House at every turn and help equip state parties with the resources needed to get out the vote, win elections and regain control of Congress.

"We will transform the anger about Florida into energy about politics," McAuliffe told the DNC delegates. We will prove there is victory after denial, democracy after Florida … justice after the United States Supreme Court. We will give the American people a Congress that they can be proud of, and we will show George Bush the door in 2004."

Today McAuliffe reiterated his assertions, saying, "the Supreme Court stopped the counting of the votes, and if they'd let the count go on, Al Gore would have got the necessary votes."

Still, McAuliffe said, "I'm not fighting the election. We need to make sure that people understand what happened in the 2000 election."

Rival Jackson Withdraws

McAuliffe, 43, best known as a prolific fund-raiser for BillClinton, won election by voice vote hours after his rival,former Atlanta Mayor Maynard Jackson, withdrew from the race.Jackson's supporters conceded early Saturday that he did not havethe votes to beat McAuliffe.

"We've been in this stuff long enough so we can count," saidAl Edwards, a Texas legislator who is chairman of the DNC's BlackCaucus. "Terry had the votes."

The caucus had supported Jackson, 62, the first black mayor of amajor Southern city.