Only one Virginia governor has served in the office twice. Until recently, former Gov. Terry McAuliffe seemed well-positioned to become the second person to do so.

But a return bid to Richmond by McAuliffe, 62, may be hampered by residual anger over his handling of the August 2017 Charlottesville, Virginia, riots and budding resentment about his new book chronicling the events, Beyond Charlottesville: Taking a Stand Against White Nationalism.

By state law, Virginia governors are elected to four-year terms but can't immediately run again. One state chief executive, Mills Godwin, served two non-consecutive tenures from 1966 to 1970 and from 1974 to 1978 — first as a Democrat and then as a Republican, as the GOP's strength spread across the South in the 1970s.

McAuliffe, a former Democratic National Committee chairman, a prodigious fundraiser for the party over four decades, and a Bill and Hillary Clinton confidante, was governor from 2014 to 2018, his first time holding public office. McAuliffe hasn't said he's contesting the governorship again in 2021 but has hinted strongly at it.

"I'm passionate about Virginia," he said last week during a book tour stop at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C. "You never know where life is going to take you."

McAuliffe eyed a 2020 presidential run but didn't jump in as it became clearer former Vice President Joe Biden would seek the Democratic nomination. A second stint in Virginia governor's mansion instead seemed like a natural next step.

McAuliffe left office a year-and-a-half ago fairly popular. A RealClearPolitics average of polls from fall 2017 gave him an average approval rating of 49% compared to a 37% disapproval rating. That came only months after the Charlottesville episode, in which three people died.

White supremacist James Alex Fields drove a car into a crowd protesting a white nationalist rally, killing Heather Heyer, 32. Fields in December was convicted of first-degree murder and nine other charges. Two Virginia state troopers, Lt. H. Jay Cullen, 48, and Trooper-Pilot Berke M. M. Bates, 40, also died in a helicopter crash as they made their way to the city to assist with security and public safety.

McAuliffe offers his version of events in Beyond Charlottesville. He recounts declaring a state of emergency in Charlottesville when white supremacists descended on the college town in August 2017. He blames the ACLU, in part, for successfully suing to grant white supremacists a permit to march. McAuliffe is additionally deeply critical of President Trump, who infamously said he found “hatred, bigotry and violence on many sides.” McAuliffe chides Trump for failing to condemn the marchers' for their rhetoric.

His explanations, though, haven't pleased everybody. His book tour appearances in Washington, D.C., at the National Press Club last week and at the Politics and Prose bookstore the week before were disrupted by protesters. And those dissenting views have cast some doubt on whether another gubernatorial bid is viable in the shadow of Charlottesville.

Activists' outrage at the McAuliffe administration "for not being more heavy-handed and not being more proactive when it came to stopping the neo-Nazis from organizing and the white supremacists from marching" was drowned out by the uproar surrounding Trump's defense of those at the rally, said Quentin Kidd, a Christopher Newport University political science professor.

"It's just that there was such shock at what happened, and such shock at the death of Heather Heyer, and it fit into this larger, national conversation that revolved around Donald Trump and the way that he was responding to it that, in terms of the national media's portrayal, I think the McAuliffe administration and local authorities got off a little bit," Kidd told the Washington Examiner.

A spokesman for McAuliffe didn't respond to the Washington Examiner's request for comment.

But Kidd said McAuliffe should hardly be counted out for 2021. Virginia's current Democratic governor, Ralph Northam, was outed earlier this year for wearing blackface in a medical school yearbook. Northam's low profile since has allowed McAuliffe to emerge as a leading voice for Virginia Democrats, particularly as the party aims to capture majorities in both chambers of the statehouse in fall 2019.

And McAuliffe's two main potential rivals for the 2021 Democratic gubernatorial nomination have faced public relations problems of their own. After the Northam revelation, Attorney General Mark Herring admitted to wearing blackface to a college party four decades earlier. And Lt. Gov. Justin Fairfax simultaneously became embroiled in sexual misconduct allegations, accusations he's denied.

"I think Democrats look to McAuliffe, his energy, his ability to raise money, Democrats generally like him, and so he's sort of the surrogate campaign governor while Ralph Northam serves as the governor," Kidd said.

University of Richmond political science professor Daniel Palazzolo warned the Charlottesville furor may grow into a larger controversy for McAuliffe.

"One is just the authenticity of the account, and so that could come up in a campaign. And then the second has to do with the challenge of race, and that's become, rightfully so, a critical issue with so many dimensions," Palazzolo said. "To the extent that voters perceive him as an opportunist or something then that could be an issue on the campaign," he added.