With the March 19 primary fast approaching, the three Republicans battling for their party’s nomination for governor took direct aim Tuesday at each other’s credibility in a contentious radio debate broadcast statewide.
Corinne Wood, Illinois lieutenant governor, contended that rival Jim Ryan had received more than $1.7 million in campaign contributions from private law firms that he contracted with to represent the state during his eight years as Illinois attorney general.
“What do you call these, contributions? Are these commissions?” Wood said in the debate, broadcast by the Illinois Radio Network from the Old State Capitol. “Are you saying this is business as usual?”
Ryan shot back: “No one can buy me.” He said Wood “of all people, as part of this administration, should never use the term `business as usual.'”
Indeed, the debate opened with a stinging repudiation by Ryan and another candidate, state Sen. Patrick O’Malley of Palos Park, of the outgoing administration of Gov. George Ryan.
“(His) record is certainly a legitimate matter of comment because Corinne Wood was a full and equal partner, to quote the governor, in the administration,” the attorney general said. He noted that the incumbent governor flip-flopped by raising taxes and fees, expanding gambling and backing expansion of O’Hare International Airport.
O’Malley said the outgoing governor’s record is represented by “why we have such a spirited and contested” primary race. And O’Malley faulted the attorney general for failing to open up an investigation of a licenses for bribes scandal in the secretary of state’s office when George Ryan ran it.
“The greatest corruption in the history of the state of Illinois occurred under his watch and he didn’t lift a finger,” O’Malley said of Jim Ryan.
The attorney general again maintained that it would have been duplicative when the federal government was conducting its own investigation.
Meanwhile, Democratic attorney general candidate John Schmidt Tuesday unveiled his first television commercials of the primary, a long-awaited $1.5 million blitz that questions the credentials of his challenger, state Sen. Lisa Madigan of Chicago.
In the ads, Schmidt, a former U.S. Justice Department official, implies that his opponent, who has been practicing law for four years, does not have enough experience to handle the job.
The debut of the commercials wasn’t without controversy. Madigan’s campaign press secretary, David Schaper, crashed the event, held in Schmidt’s private campaign headquarters in Chicago.
Schmidt aides allowed Schaper to remain in the room but chalked up the unusual move to the aggressiveness of Madigan’s campaign as well as a lack of experience on the part of her spokesman.
Lack of experience also was the theme of one of Schmidt’s ads, which questioned whether Madigan, the daughter of powerful Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan, had the legal background to hold the job as the state’s top lawyer compared with Schmidt’s almost three decades in the legal profession.
“Madigan has no law enforcement experience,” a narrator says. “She’s never directed a single investigation or prosecution.”
Schaper said Madigan worked on community policing with beat officers in the Austin neighborhood of Chicago.
More Top Picks At T Tl86103