Secretary of State Jesse White Talks Politics: 'Profaning Harold Washington'

RAUNER
AP Photo

Were Harold Washington around today, I believe he would see Rauner’s false promises and phony ploys from a mile away. What’s more, I believe he would see Rauner’s TRUE record in our community as a spit in our face.
As for Pat Quinn’s record – we know where HE stands. He inherited a mess and is fighting hard to bring Illinois back.
And Gov. Quinn’s efforts for the African-American community go well beyond election-year window dressing. It starts with his efforts to bring the Illinois economy back from the brink of the Great Recession. That was caused by the very type of reckless speculation and greed that Rauner supports and profits from – he even tells the unemployed to “get over it” when they talk about the economic pain that was suffered. This is wrong for our community.
Secondly, Gov. Quinn supported President Obama in expanding healthcare to our community through the Affordable Care Act and he took Medicaid money to expand coverage. Rauner mocked the president, called health care expansion a “disaster” and has vowed to remove Medicaid coverage from those newly insured. Rauner stands with people who call the president every name in the book and with individuals like Joe Walsh who use racist slurs. This is wrong for our community.
Gov. Quinn has moved decisively to stop the flow of military-style assault weapons into our streets and has met with victims of gun violence to understand their pain. Rauner is a pawn of the National Rifle Association and believes assault weapons and high-capacity ammunition magazines can be used whenever anybody wants. This is wrong for our community.
Gov. Quinn has signed legislation to give certain offenders a second chance to contribute to our community. Rauner not only opposes these efforts – he is seeking to score cheap political points by running ads attacking these efforts and by exploiting images of African-American men. We know the code in our community.
Gov. Quinn has expanded minority-owned contracts by 60 percent. Rauner has a dismal record at recruiting, training and hiring people of color and couldn’t even “find” a single African-American executive to work at his investment firm. Zero out of 51 people at his firm were African-American. How do you think Rauner would govern?
But more than anything, the true Bruce Rauner is on display when you see his opposition to the minimum wage. I’m not talking raising the wage, I’m talking about any minimum wage at all. He’s perfectly fine making money off low-wage, no-protection workers and, sadly, that’s the real way I believe he views our community.
There’s no way on God’s green earth that Bruce Rauner could look Harold Washington in the eye and say that lowering – or eliminating – the minimum wage would be good for the African-American community in Illinois.
Given the amount of money he has in the bank, I would expect you’ll see more miraculous converts to Rauner’s side, even some who are living. But no amount of money can change the fact that it’s Governor Quinn who is on ours.
I appreciate Rauner’s recent vacations to our community, the money he is willing to spend and the fact that he features a diverse range of people in his commercials attacking Gov. Quinn. I even appreciate the fact he understands that Harold Washington is someone who is important to our community.
But the fact is, Bruce Rauner doesn’t know the real Harold, and he would do well to leave it at that.

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