Illinois Attorney General Candidates Hold Final Televised Debate

CHICAGO — Illinois will have a new attorney general next year. Although the race to replace Democratic incumbent Lisa Madigan has been overshadowed by the massive spending on the governor's race and tight congressional races, both leading candidates to become the state's next chief lawyer say they would act as a bulwark against overreach from the other party. The Democratic nominee for the open seat promises to protect Illinoisans from potentially unconstitutional policies of the federal government, while the Republican nominee said

Urbana Republican Erika Harold, 38, used the prize money from winning the 2003 Miss America pageant on tuition for Harvard Law School. She worked as an attorney in two major Chicago-based firms before joining the Champaign County firm of Meyer Capel. She has identified investigating public corruption, stronger ethics rules, fairly enforcing the state's laws and protecting victims of crime and abuse and said she would be a check on a state government with a House, Senate and governor's mansion controlled by Democrats, should J.B. Pritkzer win.

Chicago Democrat Kwame Raoul, 54, is the son of Haitian immigrants, a survivor of prostate cancer and a former Cook County prosecutor. In 2004, he was appointed to Barack Obama's former state Senate seat representing the Hyde Park neighborhood on Chicago's South Side. He has identified criminal justice reform, protecting children from abuse and protecting workers from labor law violations. He has also promised to challenge the Trump Administration in court if it threatens the rule of law or the rights of Illinoisans.

Both candidates said they will build on Madigan's record of consumer protection, and both said they would work to improve transparency by eliminating the backlog in complaints to the office of the public access counselor, which investigates violations of the Illinois Freedom of Information Act and Open Meetings Act. During the WTTW debate, Raoul said he would explore options on a case-by-case basis without offering specifics, while Harold recommended the office issue more binding opinions. (A ProPublica analysis of nearly 30,000 found governmental bodies routinely ignore or misinterpret the FOIA and OMA and issued binding opinions in just 7 percent of cases.)

Both candidates have benefited from their parties' deep pocketed benefactors. Harold has received more than $3.5 million from Gov. Rauner's campaign committee and hedge fund CEO Ken Griffin. Raoul has picked up nearly $3 million from J.B. Pritzker's campaign and millions more from labor-backed political action committees. WTTW's Marin asked both candidates if they were embarrassed by the amount of money in the race.

"There's never been a campaign contribution that has dictated how I act," Raoul said.

"I think it's an unfortunate reality of having to spend a lot of money to get your message out," Harold said.

Both candidates were asked if they were prepared to take the helm of such a large an administrative undertaking, with about 400 lawyers and 400 other staff members.

Harold said the job of attorney general is to set the priorities of the office, shepherding its resources to fulfill its statutory responsible and use the remaining resources to best improve people's lives.

"Administration is not what I bring. Part of it is managing large, complex commercial and civil litigation, but also it's work in the arena of criminal justice policy," Harold said. "And being able to set priorities that would move the state of Illinois forward."

Raoul said he may not have administered any large organizations but he has broad range of experiences to prepare him for the job.

"I've supervised lawyers as a partner at two major law firms, I've worked at a community college system that covered seven community colleges," Raoul said. "I've negotiated with 13 collective bargaining units, I've litigated cases in both state and federal court and at the administrative level, I've prosecuted cases before and I've served 14 years as a policymaker."

Other topics of discussion included sexual harassment in Springfield, gun control and what expanded powers they would seek for the office – Harold suggested the ability to convene statewide grand juries, while Raoul pointed to legislation he has sponsored to allow the office to bypass the Illinois Department of Labor to prosecute worker's rights violations.

The candidates were asked for their assessment of their party's respective leadership, Gov. Bruce Rauner for Harold and House Speaker Mike Madigan for Raoul. Raoul described Madigan's tenure as a "mixed bag," pointing to work to abolish the death penalty and protect voting rights, "but there's also been a lot of impasse in Springfield that I believe has been unnecessary." Raoul said he had tried to break that impasse in the state Senate. Harold said Rauner's greatest successes were in the realm of criminal justice reform, including bipartisan changes to civil asset forfeiture and bail bond laws, but "everyone was frustrated by the budget impasse that was a result of not enough action on both sides of the aisle."

The candidates recorded a joint appearance Monday at a televised forum on WTTW's Chicago Tonight moderated by Carol Marin:

Raoul has been leading in recent polls and has earned the endorsement of the Chicago Sun-Times, Daily Herald, State Journal-Register, the St. Louis American editorial boards. Harold has been endorsed by the editorial boards of Chicago Tribune, the Peoria Journal Star, the Rockford Register Star, the News-Gazette in Champaign and the Rock Island Dispatch-Argus. Harold, Raoul and Libertarian nominee Bubba Harsy, a Du Quote attorney, appeared in a forum with the Sun-Times board last month.

If either of the major party candidates are elected, Illinois will seat its second African-American attorney general after Roland Burris, who served from 1991 to 1995 before being appointed by imprisoned former Gov. Rob Blagojevich to fill the U.S. Senate seat vacated by Barack Obama after his election to the presidency. That appointment has factored into the gubernatorial race as well, with Gov. Rauner repeatedly hearkening back to wiretapped conversations between his Democratic opponent and the governor discussing possible candidates.

Candidate websites, campaign finance records:

• Erika Harold (R) — Citizens for Erika Harold
• Kwame Raoul (D) — Raoul for Illinois
• Bubba Harsy (L) — No Committee