Thursday, March 3, 2011

Will the Mayor-elect be involved in our run-off election next month?

I wrote about this last week. Nothing new was being said really at the Chicago News Coop, however, it's worth lifting some quotes from this article:
Ald. Freddrenna Lyle (6th Ward) and Ald. Daniel Solis (25th) told the Chicago News Cooperative on Wednesday that they spoke with Emanuel and he assured them of his backing.
...
Lyle said she spoke with Emanuel last week, soon after he won 55 percent of the vote to replace retiring Mayor Richard M. Daley.

“He said, ‘I’m willing to support you if you want my help,’” Lyle said.

Lyle, who is in a runoff against Roderick Sawyer, said she is scheduled to speak Thursday with an Emanuel campaign aide about the form that the mayor-elect’s support will take.

“If anything, it will be some financial support,” Lyle said. “Maybe it will be an appearance in the ward. I don’t know yet.”

Lyle endorsed Carol Moseley Braun for mayor, but Emanuel captured a majority of the vote in her South Side ward in the six-candidate race.

“He won every black ward,” Lyle said. “Obviously, my people are comfortable with Rahm Emanuel and his reform agenda.”
BTW, Worlee over at Concerned Citizens of Chatham posted an article from the Tribune about money from a pro-business group aligned with Rahm Emanuel:
The leader of the group, For A Better Chicago, said there has been no coordination with Emanuel's campaign but acknowledged the group is working to get a pro-business, pro-Emanuel council elected.

"We're very supportive of Rahm and what he wants to accomplish and want to continue to drive and push him to follow through — and help move those same agenda items through the City Council," said Greg Goldner, a veteran Chicago political consultant who managed Emanuel's successful 2002 bid for Congress. "His campaign commitments and positions are very similar to ours."

Emanuel has said he will support candidates who adopt his pro-reform agenda, but a campaign spokesman said Wednesday that help will come "directly through his own political committee."

"The mayor-elect didn't have anything to do with the establishment of For A Better Chicago," said spokesman Ben LaBolt. "In fact, For A Better Chicago supported a number of aldermanic candidates who supported other candidates for mayor."

Created after Daley announced he wasn't seeking re-election, For A Better Chicago is a nonprofit allowed under federal law to protect the identity of its donors. The group formed a political action committee in December to support council candidates, and it was funded with $855,000 from the nonprofit.
Ald. Lyle was quoted as well:
For A Better Chicago supports a number of initiatives favored by Emanuel, ranging from increasing public-private partnerships to eliminating the city's head tax on employers. Aldermanic candidates who got the group's support in the first round leading up to the Feb. 22 election filled out questionnaires on those and other topics.

"I really didn't know what their agenda was. … I have since heard it was pro-business," said Ald. Freddrenna Lyle, 6th, who received $10,000 from the group and is in a runoff against Roderick Sawyer, son of former Mayor Eugene Sawyer.

Lyle, who supported Carol Moseley Braun for mayor, said it is a good thing that most of the donations are anonymous because it removes even the appearance that candidates who receive the group's money will feel indebted to individual contributors.

"I can tell you that I do not feel beholden to a group called For A Better Chicago," said Lyle, who is among several candidates taking money from the pro-business group while also receiving the backing of Chicago labor unions.
The election is a month away and the activity is starting to heat up a little already.

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