Chicago City Wire

Former state senator and Republican Paul Schimpf is campaigning to unseat Gov. J.B. Pritzker, saying he wants to renew Illinois.

“By renewed Illinois, I mean a state that lives within its means,” Schimpf said. “We have a tremendous location. We have tremendous infrastructure resources and we have Chicago, one of the greatest cities in our country. We have so much in the way of agriculture. Just by virtue of the gifts that Illinois has been given we should be the strongest [state] in the United States of America.”

A Marine Corps veteran, Schimpf was the lead U.S. American attorney adviser to the Iraqi prosecutors in the trial of Saddam Hussein in 2006 under former President George W. Bush. He says his military service prepared him to work with people across the political and social spectrum.

“I've demonstrated that I'm able to work with people regardless of their political persuasion,” Schimpf told Chicago City Wire. “I went from working for a Republican congressman on Capitol Hill to working for an Obama administrative appointee in the Pentagon. I enjoyed and excelled in both positions.”

But Schimpf, who served in the Illinois Senate from 2017-21, is not expecting a walk in the park in his bid to defeat Pritzker, a member of one of the nation's richest families through the Hyatt hotel chain.

“He certainly has a lot more financial resources than I do but I think I'm going to be able to raise enough money to get my message out,” he said. “I don't have to match Gov. Pritzker dollar-for-dollar but I do need enough money to get my message out.”

If elected, one of Schimpf's first moves would be to rescind executive orders that he considers too broad in relation to the COVID-19 pandemic.

“I'm not going to automatically just toss out everything that the governor did,” Schimpf said. “I will give everything a thoughtful review. I also want to restore power to local elected officials because they are best positioned to assess our public safety and K-12 education needs.”

Rep. Darren Bailey (R-Xenia) sought a temporary restraining order against Pritzker last year because he thought the governor’s executive orders regarding COVID-19 had gone too far and Bailey wanted to protect civil liberties, according to media reports.

“I am going to run an aggressive campaign in the Chicagoland area even though I live in the southern part of the state [Waterloo],” Schimpf said in an interview. “I have family in the Chicago area and I plan on being in the Chicagoland area at least half of every week.”

Despite a growing trend to reject Chicago and start a new Illinois state, Schimpf’s vision to renew is inclusive.

“We need a governor who represents all the people of Illinois,” he said. “There's a lot of talk about separating Chicago from the rest of the state. I disagree with that. We need everybody in Illinois in order to work together and solve the problems we face.”