Former President Donald Trump and GOP gubernatorial candidate State Sen. Darren Bailey (R-Xenia). | Bailey campaign
Former President Donald Trump and GOP gubernatorial candidate State Sen. Darren Bailey (R-Xenia). | Bailey campaign
Top advisor to President Donald Trump and longtime Chicagoan Steve Cortes said GOP gubernatorial candidate Darren Bailey is a "clear America First champion" and the state's best hope to unseat J.B. Pritzker in November.
Cortes, writing for American Greatness, said public opinion polls show Pritzker is vulnerable, with only 51.7 percent believing he deserves re-election, but only to an "outsider" candidate like Bailey.
""Like Trump, Bailey enjoyed a comfortable and successful life in the private sector (and was) called to political action. (He) brings a Trumpian approach to political office, meaning he is an outsider who speaks bluntly and fiercely disrupts supposedly sacrosanct political practices," Cortes wrote, praising Bailey for his "tenacity" in standing alone in "strong opposition to Governor Pritzker’s tyrannical lockdowns."
"Bailey... galvanized (Illinois) citizens to fight for their constitutional rights," he wrote.
Cortes slammed Bailey rival Richard Irvin, who he called "a Democrat" who publicly backed Joe Biden over Trump and "brazenly supported the radical Black Lives Matter movement, just as BLM-sponsored riots terrorized Chicago and engaged in open street battles against brave city cops."
"How does such a limp and liberal candidate stand a chance in a GOP primary? The simple answer is that Irvin enjoys the massive financial sponsorship of hedge fund magnate Ken Griffin, the richest man in Illinois, a state where donations for state office are unlimited. Griffin believes he can fool the citizens of Illinois with a rebranded and repackaged stooge candidate pretending to be conservative," Cortes wrote.
Irvin's candidacy, he said, "represents the worst kind of manipulated political scheming from powerful backroom interests."
Cortes served as senior advisor for strategy in Trump's 2020 campaign and was a campaign spokesman in his 2016 presidential run.
He lived in Chicago's Lincoln Park neighborhood for two decades, grew up in south suburban Park Forest and attended Marian Catholic H.S. in Chicago Heights.
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