* Tina Sfondeles on the Sun-Times editorial board meeting with the AG candidates…

State Sen. Kwame Raoul, the Democratic candidate for Illinois Attorney General, on Tuesday tried to paint his Republican challenger as an inexperienced litigator with shifty views on same-sex marriage and adoption — while Erika Harold offered rebukes of the Democrat’s accusations and vowed not to use the post to “punish political opponents.” […]

Both Raoul and Harold took issue with their opponent’s critical ads on constant rotation on TV right now. Raoul has run three ads which claim Harold said at age 19 that she’d prefer a child be placed in a foster home with abusive straight parents over being placed in a home with a “loving gay couple.” The comments were allegedly made during a closed-door interview with Harold, who was a Miss Illinois contestant, according to a story on NBC5 that cited three unnamed sources.

Harold’s campaign initially said she did not recall making those comments and says she now supports same-sex couples being able to adopt and being able to be foster parents. She noted the ads had been rated “false” by Politifact. […]

For his part, Raoul accused Harold of changing her mind on same-sex marriage in light of the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision regarding marriage equality. […]

Sun-Times Editorial Board editor Tom McNamee asked Harold if her views about same-sex marriage and adoption would change should the U.S. Supreme Court overturn marriage equality.

“Of course not,” Harold said.

…Adding…. She kinda gave a different answer to WGN TV…

After the debate, Harold said same-sex marriage is the “law of the land,” and she wouldn’t do anything to undo it, but didn’t comment on her personal feelings on the matter.

* Tribune…

In a Harold ad, she calls the real estate tax system a “scheme” and alleges “Mike Madigan and Kwame Raoul team up to raise property taxes.” It’s a reference to a bill Raoul and Madigan co-sponsored that originally contained language allowing the City Council to up its levy for pensions as part of a comprehensive deal with unions. The tax hike language was ultimately struck from the final bill. […]

“I stand by the fact that Sen. Raoul, instead of actually trying to do something to change that system, (serving as) the chief co-sponsor with Madigan, that would have only exacerbated this problem,” she said.

Raoul countered that the legislation offered the “tools” to help the city with its pension burden.

“I’ve never worked on a property tax appeals case in my life. I’ve never been at a firm that did any such work. But the insinuation in these commercials is that I’d engaged in that type of activity,” he said.

* ABC 7…

Both candidates stood by their ads, and there was no indication they won’t keep running them, which just points out the nature of political ads and what we can expect this political season.

My view: I think there are significant flaws with Politifact’s ratings on both ads in question (in one case they ignored the actual history of the property tax bill and in the other case they took a dispute over an opinion and turned it into hard facts). However, since both candidates have publicly touted Politifact’s false ratings of their opponents’ ads, they ought to both abide by the ruling and pull them. Either that, or stop playing that game.

* NBC 5…

Meanwhile, Libertarian candidate Harsy joined Raoul and Harold in saying they support the legalization of marijuana.

“We have bigger problems in Illinois going on right now than whether or not somebody smoke a plant that’s never killed anybody,” Harsy said.

* Watch the session yourself if you’d like…