* Brian Mackey…

Gov. J.B. Pritzker’s campaign operation is striking back against a group of former workers who’re suing for racial discrimination.

Lawyers for Pritzker’s campaign say eight of the 12 defendants have blown deadlines, provided incomplete answers to questions, and ignored obligations to sit for depositions.

Because of that, they’re asking a federal judge to dismiss those plaintiffs from the case.

* From the filing…

1. After weeks of attempting to schedule Plaintiffs’ depositions, eight Plaintiffs still have not provided available dates for their depositions to occur by the extended December 10 deadline.

2. In addition, none of the Plaintiffs have supplemented the information they withheld from their interrogatory responses based on untimely objections that the Court ruled they had waived. They have taken the position that the Court ordered them only to supplement their document productions.

* From the memorandum in support of the motion…

Defendants request that the Court enter an order (1) dismissing with prejudice the claims of the eight Plaintiffs whom counsel have refused to provide dates for depositions to occur by December 10, (2) compelling the remaining four Plaintiffs to supplement their interrogatory responses with information withheld on the basis of untimely and waived objections and ordering Plaintiffs and their counsel to pay Defendants’ reasonable fees and costs associated with retaking any deposition based on late supplementation, and (3) granting Defendants’ reasonable attorneys’ fees and costs in bringing this motion. […]

Plaintiffs’ consistent position has been that their counsel are simply too busy to complete discovery in the time period ordered by the Court. Defendants cannot effectively defend this case unless they take Plaintiffs’ depositions, and the only way to do so now is to again extend discovery–which would effectively reward Plaintiffs’ misconduct. In these circumstances, while dismissal is a serious sanction, Defendants respectfully submit it is the right one here.

* And this isn’t the first delay…

Finally, on September 19, Defendants received a CD containing the discovery responses and document productions. The discovery letter accompanying the materials was dated September 16–three days after Plaintiffs said they mailed the materials–and neither of the two separately mailed packages had any postmarks indicating when they had been sent. Despite finally responding more than six weeks late, Plaintiffs nevertheless raised several objections, confirming during a subsequent meet and confer on October 1 that they withheld documents based on those untimely objections. The verification pages that Plaintiffs submitted with their interrogatory responses further showed that several Plaintiffs did not complete their responses until September–well after the August 2 deadline.

…Adding… Some context…

Among the 8 is the plaintiff who made claims about #Peoria hotel accommodations.

You'll recall the Pritzker campaign refuted those claims the same day:https://t.co/SxhmaOUniz https://t.co/OmRahryxlc

— Chris Kaergard (@ChrisKaergard) December 2, 2019