Thread by @cljmitchell

What happened tonight in #ilgov?

-Voters agreed that @JBPritzker is consistent, competent and kind: he kept his promises on the budget/infrastructure and led IL through a pandemic.
- Mayor Irvin’s implosion reveals the detachment of the ILGOP from both race and reality. A 🧵:

JB promised he would raise the minimum wage, address climate change and infrastructure equitably, legalize weed + return resources to black/brown communities, and balance the budget. He promised he’d follow the science and prioritize saving lives during COVID. Done.✅

But what about the GOP establishment – specifically Ken Griffin and his team of operatives – and their selection of Richard Irvin? They banked on the idea that ILGOP voters would support a black man “to own the libs.” They turned out to be wrong: why?

You can’t spend years spinning melodies out of dog whistles, turn the word “Chicago” into a slur for a dystopian image of violence driven allegedly by the disproven trope of broken black families, lie about “voter fraud” in majority black cities as the reason you lose elections..

...constantly rave about “us” and “them” and then ask voters to forget about the foundation of racial animus you’ve built your party on because an arrogant hedge fund magnate gets his feelings hurt. 🤷‍♂️

Because of that reality – ILGOP voters will view a candidate like Irvin with more suspicion and be more reluctant to commit to him. They will be more likely to believe he's a phony candidate - especially when it's, ya know, true - and move to another candidate for any reason.

(Brief pause for a pro-tip: vulnerability research is expensive, but valuable, and can save time and money: perhaps even 6 months and $50 million)

Instead of letting him be who he maybe was, the folks that barely got Bruce Rauner over the line vs. Jeanne Ives decided they'd try to re-package a black, Republican-ish Mayor Irvin (with a record!) as a MAGA Republican who "looks [black]" but thinks "like us (the GOP)" *whistle*

And, the thought was, get through the general and he'd siphon off black votes in Chicago. That's not anyone's "worst nightmare." That's the perception of a worst nightmare conjured up by consultants who...don't know any GOP primary voters, and don't know any black people.

Because black voters - especially black women - are consistently the most sophisticated voters in America. Black voters weren't all in with Obama until he proved he could win races - not because we don't love our own, but because there are stakes for our lives in every election.

The reality of the ILGOP is founded on faustian bargains: with the xenophobic and backward looking, and the thinnest veneer of patriotism: the kind that treats the Constitution as a document on par with the Christian Bible, unless and until Donald Trump incites a violent mob.

There’s soul searching to be done here. Because the choices made by the GOP establishment are leading us to an America where women are second class citizens, it’s harder to vote, there is no separation between church and state...

and where too much wealth is concentrated in the hands of too few people. We function best with an actual two party system. But that requires Republican politicians with the courage to speak the truth and fight for the soul of their party.

I wish those who want to do so sincere luck. And until then, don’t expect Democrats to apologize for winning the fight for the soul of our country wherever and however we can. As De La Soul said, "stakes is high." /end