Quinn-Rauner Debate: Each Casts Other As State's Worst Nightmare
From the Chicago Sun-Times
In their first live, televised debate, Republican Bruce Rauner and Gov. Pat Quinn on Thursday night clashed repeatedly as each insisted the other would take the state down a treacherous path.
Rauner warned that four more years of Quinn would mean businesses would leave the state and job losses would rise.
Meanwhile, Quinn warned that if Rauner is governor, he would bring on a so-called "Rauner tax" on basic services like garbage pickup, while the rich got richer.
The two broke little new ground in the 60-minute debate in Peoria, although each seemed to have taken some time honing responses to the bombs the other has been hurling for months in TV ads.
Off the bat, Quinn got off a zinger to neutralize Rauner’s recent efforts to put a term limits question on the ballot, pointing to his own history of attempting to do so.
“He’s a born again term limits advocate,” Quinn said of Rauner.
Rauner, meanwhile, cast himself as the outsider who wants to reform a crooked state. He painted Quinn as a corrupt politician, enmeshed in a culture of cronyism and waste. Just as he has in the ads against Quinn, Rauner made parallels between the incumbent governor and imprisoned former Gov. Rod Blagojevich. Rauner called House Speaker Mike Madigan, Blagojevich and Quinn the “trio of terrible government.”
Read more in our daily News Update...
From the Chicago Sun-Times
In their first live, televised debate, Republican Bruce Rauner and Gov. Pat Quinn on Thursday night clashed repeatedly as each insisted the other would take the state down a treacherous path.
Rauner warned that four more years of Quinn would mean businesses would leave the state and job losses would rise.
Meanwhile, Quinn warned that if Rauner is governor, he would bring on a so-called "Rauner tax" on basic services like garbage pickup, while the rich got richer.
The two broke little new ground in the 60-minute debate in Peoria, although each seemed to have taken some time honing responses to the bombs the other has been hurling for months in TV ads.
Off the bat, Quinn got off a zinger to neutralize Rauner’s recent efforts to put a term limits question on the ballot, pointing to his own history of attempting to do so.
“He’s a born again term limits advocate,” Quinn said of Rauner.
Rauner, meanwhile, cast himself as the outsider who wants to reform a crooked state. He painted Quinn as a corrupt politician, enmeshed in a culture of cronyism and waste. Just as he has in the ads against Quinn, Rauner made parallels between the incumbent governor and imprisoned former Gov. Rod Blagojevich. Rauner called House Speaker Mike Madigan, Blagojevich and Quinn the “trio of terrible government.”
Read more in our daily News Update...