The event was meant to showcase Cuccinelli as a 2013 GOP gubernatorial candidate. Cuccinelli ripped by business leaders

Two prominent northern Virginia business leaders got into a heated exchange with Virginia Republican gubernatorial hopeful Ken Cuccinelli in front of a few hundred top GOP donors at a closed-door meeting Friday, multiple sources told POLITICO.

Bobbie Kilberg, a longtime Republican donor and CEO of Northern Virginia Technology Council, and Gary Shapiro, CEO of the Arlington-based Consumer Electronics Association, stood up separately to confront Cuccinelli about what is on the minds of many Virginia and national Republicans: whether the Tea Party-backed attorney general can, or wants to, run a pragmatic campaign in the increasingly moderate Old Dominion.


The face-off took place at a meeting of the Republican Governor’s Association’s “Executive Roundtable,” a group of national CEOs and business leaders, Friday morning at the Ritz-Carlton in Washington. The event was meant to showcase Cuccinelli as one of two Republican gubernatorial candidates this year.

( WATCH: Obama talks compromise with governors)

But instead of simply making his pitch and picking up a few business cards from potential donors, Cuccinelli was all but dressed down by two fellow Virginians.

Kilberg, who is close with Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell, spoke first and noted that the state has become “purple.” She pointed out that McDonnell has sought to govern in the mainstream. But then she wondered aloud if Cuccinelli’s crusading brand fits Virginia’s present political and demographic reality.

Shapiro spoke up next and was even tougher on Cuccinelli. As a hushed room looked on, Shapiro, who sits on the board of the influential Northern Virginia Technology Council, said the state’s centrist-oriented business community won’t back the Republican standard-bearer because he’s out of the mainstream.

“Gary just slammed him,” said one attendee.

Cuccinelli fiercely defended himself, noting his accomplishments and election as a state senator from Fairfax County and as attorney general in 2009.

“He was angry and hostile,” said an attendee. Another Republican in the room said Cuccinelli “handled it ok” and pointed out that the attorney general also got some more favorable questions during the session.

A Republican operative sympathetic to Cuccinelli pointed out that both Kilberg and Shapiro have made their feelings known previously about the gubernatorial candidate. Cuccinelli’s campaign declined to comment.

Asked for comment, Kilberg and Shapiro said it was a private event and that attendees were not supposed to talk to the press.

In a weekend interview with POLITICO, however, Shapiro expressed deep reservations about Cuccinelli and said he feared hard-core social conservative policies would make Virginia less attractive for business.

“I’ve told Cuccinelli I would not support him,” said Shapiro,an independent who supported Mitt Romney last year and has criticized Cuccinelli in a Washington Post op-ed. “Virginia’s incredible tilt rightward, thanks to a lot of Cuccinelli initiatives, has not been helpful at promoting Virginia as a diverse, pro-business state.”

With Cuccinelli as the national party’s most prominent off-year candidate, Shapiro said he was concerned about “how the United States views Republicans in 2013.”

That’s partly why Friday’s back-and-forth is so embarrassing for Cuccinelli: A coming-out party for the attorney general in front of a national big money crowd turned into another reminder of the internal difficulties he’s faced since pushing Republican Lt. Gov. Bill Bolling from the race in November.

High-level Republicans have privately worried for the past two months that Cuccinelli was not taking steps to mount the sort of campaign — focused on jobs, roads and schools — that McDonnell ran on with great success in 2009. The attorney general has discussed contraception with an Iowa conservative talk radio show host and was a no-show at both McDonnell’s State of the Commonwealth speech and a major fundraiser a few weeks ago in Richmond attended by McDonnell, House Majority Leader Eric Cantor and RGA Chairman and Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal.

And most recently, Cuccinelli has been on a publicity tour for his new book chronicling his battles with the Democratic president who has twice carried Virginia.

But it was his opposition to McDonnell’s transportation legislation — a legacy bill for the outgoing governor that includes new taxes — that has many establishment Republicans at their wit’s end. Cuccinelli not only publicly stated his opposition to the measure, which passed the legislature in a dramatic weekend session, but rushed an overnight legal opinion out early Saturday morning that McDonnell loyalists saw as an unambiguous attempt to torpedo the bill.

In an interview Sunday, McDonnell declined to criticize his would-be GOP successor but said he had heard about the fireworks Friday at the RGA session.

“It’s a diverse party,” he said.