* GOP gubernatorial candidate Darren Bailey’s wife, Cindy, held a press conference today to push back on Gov. JB Pritzker’s campaign ads and mailers about her husband’s views on women. From her remarks…

I know his heart, I know his character, and I know how he treats women because I’m the woman who has shared life with him. So when JB Pritzker tries to frighten women by making my husband into something he isn’t, I’m going to speak up. Darren understands that criticism comes when running for governor. I understand that too, but Governor, you have crossed a line from criticizing his positions and misrepresenting his character, and I will not let that go unanswered. You are asking women to believe that Darren would take away their voice. Well, I have never once had to ask for my husband’s permission to speak. […]

Ladies, I know what his campaign is trying to do. They want you to look at Darren and see someone who would tell you where you belong, and what your life ought to look like. That has never been my experience with him. Darren and I have made decisions together. We’ve talked things through. We’ve disagreed. We’ve listened to one another, and we’ve figured out what worked for our family. He has encouraged me. He believes in my abilities, and he respects my independence. I would not stand here and tell you tell you any of this if it were not true. I also want to say something about the mothers who choose to stay home with their children. They deserve our respect. I know smart, talented, hardworking women who have made that decision for their families. My three daughter-in-laws are three of them. They should never be made to feel that their contribution is somehow smaller because it doesn’t come with a paycheck. A woman who works outside of the home should never, ever have to defend how much they love their children. I ran a business. I ran a business while I raised my children. I know how much work follows you home. A women’s worth is not determined by whether she works in an office, runs a business or stays home with her children.

* Asked if there was a specific ad she was referring to…

The state has been inundated with media and with mail flyers that are going into homes, and it’s an insult. Many of them are an insult to everything that I hold near and dear, trying to portray Darren as someone that does not support me or other women in the state. And I’m not going to give it airtime. You’ll have to do your research. But it’s everywhere, everywhere.

* A sample of the ads and mailers from Pritzker’s campaign…

* The ads cite this 2022 Tribune article…

Bailey also has spoken frequently of the decline of the family unit, his view of the role of women, and has called transgender rights “the moral rot that is destroying society.”

Speaking in an interview last April, Bailey said, “God, in His creation, He intended, you know, the family unit to be headed by the dad. The dad is supposed to be out, you know, teaching his children hard work, ethics, honesty and integrity.”

* The mailer also cites a 2022 article about the school’s curriculum…

The year before he ran for a seat in the Illinois House of Representatives, Bailey and his wife Cindy launched a fundamentalist Christian school based in Louisville, Illinois, in 2016. In that same year, Bob Jones University Press was once again in the process of rewriting its history books to soften or remove some of the more dubious or offensive claims found in its pages. The BJU Press altered its textbooks on several occasions in recent years to remove racially charged content that sometimes spoke about slave owners or the Ku Klux Klan in forgiving terms. […]

5 On Your Side obtained hard copies of several of the textbooks on the shelves at Full Armor Academy. While the racially charged language is more subtle than previous editions, it is still present.

For example, textbooks on the shelves at Bailey’s school now teach students that “God regulated but did not forbid slavery.” Teachers are instructed to ask students to compare outlawing abortion to ending slavery, and to ask students to explain the strengths of the Three-Fifths Compromise, the part of the U.S. Constitution that counted slaves as three-fifths of a person.

* And this KSDK exchange from earlier this month…

MAXWELL: One reason I asked: the first-grade workbook at the school you founded does have kids draw a line from “leads the family” to “husband,” and “helps the husband” to “wife.” Is that how you think Illinois families should work?

BAILEY: I think that’s the curriculum that is being taught. And if a family so chooses to have their child educated with the curriculum that we are teaching, then they certainly have that choice.

* Asked about the school’s textbooks, Cindy Bailey said…

Reporter: I am thinking back to the tiny writing at the bottom where sometimes the campaign will source where the ads are coming from, maybe Chicago news organizations have cited that it was potentially in a textbook that was used in the school. Has that been changed over the years since you’ve been teaching there?

Cindy Bailey: That’s not in our school. Period. I will say, though, since you brought up the school, something that is very, very troubling. Again, we know campaigns that things are said. But when you stir up such hatred and vitriol hatred towards someone’s public school, whether it’s private school, whether it’s home school, that’s our right as Americans, as Illinois citizens, and because of the rhetoric about our school, the lies about our school, our children’s lives at the school have been put at stake because of threats that we have had as a result of that. That is not unity.

Reporter: have the authorities been able to update on who the perpetrators were?

No […] The state police have been working with us and were able to trace where the email came out of, but not specific enough to tie an individual with it.

…Adding… From a Pritzker campaign spokesperson…

“Darren Bailey’s record is clear: he believes women shouldn’t have a right to make their own medical decisions, and the school he founded teaches that women should be subservient to men. A last-ditch effort to save his flailing campaign doesn’t change that.”