“I don’t think there’s any dispute that I’m African American,” Lightfoot said Tuesday. “I’m Black and I’m very proud of that, so why do you need to blacken what I look like to send this ad out to suburban communities?
Chicago Mayor Lightfoot accuses a PAC supporting Bailey of running a “racist” ad. The PAC is accused of darkening the skin of Mayor Lori Lightfoot from a news clip. There are also video clips of looters with an ominous voiceover warning Chicago crime is coming to the suburbs.
It appears the Bailey campaign went from the manure pile to the sewer. There has been no word from the Bailey campaign about the racial nature of the ad. The only response was from a Bailey spokesperson:
Bailey spokesman Joe DeBose said Pritzker and Lightfoot have control over crime afflicting Chicago “and they should be more concerned with the people being killed and set on fire in the city.” (Chicago Tribune)
People, plural, are not being set on fire. Only one person was, the Walking Man. DeBose knows as little about Illinois government as his boss, Darren Bailey. The governor of Illinois has no control over crime and public safety in Chicago. They know nothing, or they are lying to scare people and garner votes.
Darren Bailey, his campaign, and those supporting his campaign, including PACs and donors, know nothing about urban affairs or issues. Chicago is not some idyllic postage stamp-sized village in the middle of nowhere. Chicago is a major city. Major cities have major issues, including crime. Mayors control cities, not governors.
Political fairy tales start with, “If elected, I promise…” The Bailey campaign is a political fairy tale, a fantasy. Bailey has not said what exactly he would do as governor to curb the rampant crime in Chicago. He offered no solutions or policies. He has none. As they say in Texas, Darren Bailey is all hat and no cattle.
Darren Bailey is the worst Illinois gubernatorial candidate from either party in my voting lifetime (Over 50 years). If you are running for high public office against an incumbent, you should demonstrate why you deserve to oust them. You should have clear-cut policy issues with believable and deliverable solutions. You should be able to articulate them. All Bailey does is blow smoke.
Governor Pritzker angered many in the law enforcement and prosecutorial communities by signing the SAFE-T act, which is anything but. Some claim he should have vetoed or used a line-item veto on certain portions of the legislation. What good would that do? The legislature has a veto-proof majority and could or would have overridden him. It is called reality. The bill does not go into effect until next year. Pritzker and some Democratic legislators promised to take a second look at the legislation and fix issues of concern.
The Pritzker family started in Chicago. Governor Pritzker lives in Chicago. He made Chicago his hometown. Pritzker is a Chicagoan. Some of the violent crimes occur near his Chicago home. If Pritzker had the power to curb the rampant crime in this city, he would have wielded it long ago. Pritzker knows the limitations of his powers. Darren Bailey and his backers do not know anything.
Darren Bailey is in a no lose situation. He gets his mug plastered all over the state. He went from being a nobody nobody knew to a known high-profile commodity. When he loses the general election, he will still have his part-time job as a legislator. He can go back to fighting the fairy tale demons that he has apocalyptic visions of who are destroying Illinois.