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Pritzker campaign mocks Rauner over new hires

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* Pritzker campaign…

During his 2014 campaign, Bruce Rauner repeatedly bragged about the “superstars” he would bring into state government. With these “superstars,” he claimed he would “drive a result” and revitalize state government with an outsider perspective.

Fast forward to present and Rauner’s new team of “superstars” is actually a group of radical right-wing Illinois Policy Institute staffers with limited government experience and fantasy budget proposals. The only result they’re going to achieve is further devastation and more crises as schools and working families continue to pay the price.

“The only thing this new team will be super at is dragging Illinois down a right-wing path of economic destruction,” said Pritzker campaign spokeswoman Jordan Abudayyeh. “In the backward fantasyland they’ve proposed, Illinois children will be left with shuttered school buildings and public universities will shut down. With these ‘superstars’ charting the course, it’s clear that Bruce Rauner is looking to retire with a bang.”

* Video…

* Transcript…

We need to assemble the most talented team of leaders and executives who’ve ever turned around a state government, and that’s what we’re going to do. That’s what I’ve done my whole life. Every time we start a business or invest in a business or build a business, we try and put the most talented team that really knows that industry or that sector. That’s what we do. That’s what I’ve done for 32 years. I’ve assembled dozens and dozens and dozens of super talented teams. That’s how we succeeded. Evelyn and I are committed to assembling talent. The most talented people from around Illinois we want to bring them into here, into Springfield to turn the government around.

You know, Mitch Daniels is my role model. Mitch Daniels brought in 30 superstars from the private sector around Indiana and around America into Indianapolis and had them put in charge of the government to run the government efficiently and effectively and transparently, and that’s exactly what we want to do here.

Now be careful. If you raise your hands during this, I may actually recruit you to come in and work for the government, so be slow to raise your hand. But I want to assemble… we’re very blessed. We’ve already had many executives come to us and say ‘Bruce, like your leadership, like your message, love the state of Illinois, and I’d be willing to work for a dollar a year too. I’ll give back for a few years. We’ll come in, and we’ll work for the government and help transform it.’ We need expertise in pensions, expertise in Medicaid, expertise in tax strategy, expertise in business policy, expertise in workers comp.

We need brilliant people who are doing it for the right reasons to drive a result.

I wonder whatever happened to all those business executives who said they’d work for a dollar a year?

posted by Rich Miller
Thursday, Jul 13, 17 @ 2:18 pm

Comments

For me, the most eye-opening part was his mention of Evelyn.

Evelyn! Remember her? What’s she up to now? I heard she moved to Nova Scotia and took up fishing…

Comment by Arsenal Thursday, Jul 13, 17 @ 2:23 pm
===I wonder whatever happened to all those business executives who said they’d work for a dollar a year?===

They probably saw the turn around agenda and realized he wasn’t taking things seriously and that it would be a waste of their time.

Who wants to give up a part of their career to be part of someone’s joke?

Comment by Anon Thursday, Jul 13, 17 @ 2:25 pm
===wonder whatever happened to all those business executives who said they’d work for a dollar a year?===

They are hanging out with “Jim”

Jim?

Yeah, “Jim”, Donald Trump’s friend who use to love to go to France, and Paris. Now, “Jim” hasn’t been back in a long time.

They’re all hanging with “Jim”

Comment by Oswego Willy Thursday, Jul 13, 17 @ 2:27 pm
This reminds me of something my Grandma used to say about a fox and a hen house.

Comment by Gruntled University Employee Thursday, Jul 13, 17 @ 2:29 pm
Huh-huh. “Bidness.” Huh-huh.

Wow.

Comment by ButtisAndBeavhead Thursday, Jul 13, 17 @ 2:32 pm
Gosh is JB annoying or what?

Comment by Anonymous Thursday, Jul 13, 17 @ 2:32 pm
===I wonder whatever happened to all those business executives who said they’d work for a dollar a year? ===

No offense to your home town, Rich, but have you seen Springfield?

I’ll be equal opportunity and throw Peoria under the bus as well. We all know Caterpillar didn’t really leave to be closer to O’Hare. Already wealthy business people don’t want anything to do with central Illinois. Can you blame them? I can’t.

For better or for worse, political hacks will always be willing to move to Springfield. But as we’ve seen, all of the hacks in the world can’t convince Rauner to stop making bonehead, unforced errors in his retirement pastime of governing, so what’s the point?

Comment by Dick Butka Thursday, Jul 13, 17 @ 2:34 pm
==With these ‘superstars’ charting the course, it’s clear that Bruce Rauner is looking to retire with a bang.”==

Shouldn’t that read “big bang”?

Comment by City Zen Thursday, Jul 13, 17 @ 2:36 pm
If Mitch Daniels is his role model, is he talking to him? I think not.

Mitch is a policy workwho dug into details. He also worked both sides of the aisle.

Comment by Last Bull Moose Thursday, Jul 13, 17 @ 2:38 pm
One dollar a year? Well, you get what you pay for and we’ve been overcharged.

Comment by CharlieKratos Thursday, Jul 13, 17 @ 2:47 pm
Speaking of Evelyn, the only thing I’ve heard her doing in ages is oppose efforts to keep Asian Carp out of the Great Lakes because it would be inconvenient for business. That’s quite the good use of a Guv Lite.

Comment by Anonymous Thursday, Jul 13, 17 @ 2:48 pm
They were superstars before they were not superstars.

Comment by Norseman Thursday, Jul 13, 17 @ 2:49 pm
Almost kind of proto-Trump there with his whole, it’s gonna be the best team with the best people, superstars. Ah simpler times.

Comment by Sonny Thursday, Jul 13, 17 @ 2:50 pm
The dollar-a-year execs are at the hundreds of corporatiöns Rauner said he had lined up to move into the state.

From Fantasy Island.

Comment by wordslinger Thursday, Jul 13, 17 @ 2:50 pm
This video wouldn’t have an impact if Rauner kept looking for that silver lining in every event since his election. We’ve seen how governors look like they’ve been eating a DQ Peant Buster Parfait when they’re actually nose-deep in a sewer.

They do that because they feel responsible for the state and know they’ve done their best on each issue. They have a bigger picture of what they want to accomplish along with endless schemes to get there. They are not depending upon their “persistent rascal” do-or-die stands. They don’t double down.

Bruce Rauner is so completely unsuitable to govern he seems to instinctively go repeatedly to the worse methods in governing. He’s so bad, he believes he is really a genius. He’s so blinded to his shortcoming, he only listens to himself.

What’s worse is what he’s done to conservative governing methods and those that followed him right off our fiscal cliffs. Rauner has blown up ILGOP and discredited good governing.

He’s Henry Hill from “The Music Man”, except the Hill character knew when to skip town. Rauner doesn’t.

Someone at ILGOP has to tell him that the jig is up. It is better to lose an election then to win it just to show everyone that the party can’t be entrusted to govern.

Comment by VanillaMan Thursday, Jul 13, 17 @ 2:51 pm
===No offense to your home town, Rich, but have you seen Springfield?===

It’s not my home town and plenty of people work out of the governor’s Chicago office.

Comment by Rich Miller Thursday, Jul 13, 17 @ 2:52 pm
You can’t find a better businessman to turn around the business climate in Illinois than Jim Schultz. What that guy did first at DCEO, and then at Intersect, has been unprecedented.

And to think he was able to do it all while keeping his day job.

Comment by Henry Francis Thursday, Jul 13, 17 @ 2:57 pm
The biggest flaw in this thinking is the assumption that people who run businesses will know how to run a government. Running a business is very much NOT like running a government, a vexation which I think Mr. Rauner has discovered.

Comment by NoGifts Thursday, Jul 13, 17 @ 3:00 pm
That first round of “superstars” cost the state a lot of money. The raises he gave them all over the last 2 years have been insane. I cannot wait to see the salaries of the new and improved superstars from the IPI. They always talked about overpaid state employees. Let’s see what salaries they end up having as a state employee.

Comment by OpenYourEyes Thursday, Jul 13, 17 @ 3:02 pm
1) Evelyn Who? I think the last time I saw her was on a milk carton.

2) Mitch Daniels? Yea, the only similarity with Mitch Daniels is that they’re both white Republicans with X and Y chromosomes. Otherwise it looks like he’s using him as a negative role model.

3) Henry Francis, I assume you’re being facetious about Jim Schultz. First, he completed the destruction of DCEO. Then he wasted time creating a useless “public-private” partnership that has accomplished nothing.

Comment by Chicago Cynic Thursday, Jul 13, 17 @ 3:17 pm
The new fodder seems to be Chicago based. And he was going to move government back to the Patch. Oh well, another mark on the list of unfulfilled promises.

Comment by Meh Thursday, Jul 13, 17 @ 3:34 pm
CC - I’ll let Jimmy’s record speak for itself.

I guess I should have put a /s at the end of my initial comment.

Comment by Henry Francis Thursday, Jul 13, 17 @ 4:10 pm
==Gosh is JB annoying or what?==

For Rauner, sure. Driving the discussion on here today, that’s almost exactly what they want to be doing right now.

Right now.

Comment by Arsenal Thursday, Jul 13, 17 @ 4:44 pm
Was it really his team was giving him the wrong advice and analysis or just the truth that he didn’t want to hear? I’m not sure Rauner clearly sees his end game and realistic paths of getting there. Now he’ll be surrounded with folks with no experience of results, so that’ll be sure to help things along.

Comment by Veil of Ignorance Thursday, Jul 13, 17 @ 5:02 pm
J. B. Pritzker could be the textbook example of a “political also ran.”

Comment by Walter Concrete Thursday, Jul 13, 17 @ 5:50 pm
===J. B. Pritzker could be the textbook example of a “political also ran.”===

Really? How so?

Be specific.

Thanks.

Comment by Oswego Willy Thursday, Jul 13, 17 @ 5:51 pm
=== J. B. Pritzker could be the textbook example of a “political also ran.” ===

I’d give this partisan drive by a D-. Totally lacks any originality and has no relation to the post.

Comment by Norseman Thursday, Jul 13, 17 @ 6:10 pm
If I had three and a half billion, jerks could call me a political also-ran all day long and I would care less. In fact, I could care less now.

Comment by Arthur Andersen Thursday, Jul 13, 17 @ 7:11 pm
Pritzker is not a shoe-in for his party. I think there will be some push back for the Billionaire.

Comment by BP Thursday, Jul 13, 17 @ 9:45 pm
It’s couldn’t care less. If you could care less you do care.

Comment by Anonymous Thursday, Jul 13, 17 @ 10:26 pm
Change is not always a bad thing but the outsiders needed to keep or hire some insiders with insight on how things actually operate in Springfield. Not the way the Guv hopes or wishes or demands, but as they actually work. Even though agencies have been hacked up for years there are still folks in them that know whats what and who is who. They also know when to duck. Regardless who wins in 2018 there is damage to State that may take decades to fix.

Comment by NorthsideNoMore Thursday, Jul 13, 17 @ 10:34 pm
Governor term limits finally shook up Springfield. Unfortunately that shakeup came at the expense of some of his loyal staffers. Have you noticed Durkin, Ives & Wehrli have been silent? Heck even Sandack went back to talking baseball.

Comment by LouLecture Friday, Jul 14, 17 @ 5:43 am
Is 32 significant, been in business 32 years, cos a 32 year old, reinstated tax 32%, taxes freeze at 32 degrees

Comment by Rabid Friday, Jul 14, 17 @ 6:52 am