Cook County State's Attorney Candidate: Bill Conway

CHICAGO — Democrat Bill Conway is running for Cook County state's attorney. On the ballot, you will be able to vote for one of four candidates: Conway, incumbent Kim Foxx and other challengers Donna More and Bob Fioretti.

You can find Conway's answers to the Patch candidate questionnaire below:

Bill Conway, running for Cook County State's Attorney:

Age (as of Election Day)

41

Town/City of Residence

Chicago

Office Sought

State's Attorney

Party Affiliation

Democrat

Family

Brittany (wife), Bella (3-month-old daughter)

Does anyone in your family work in politics or government?

My aunt works for Evergreen Park and I have cousins who are first responders. My wife’s cousin is an Assistant State’s Attorney at the Cook County State’s Attorney’s Office.

Education

University of Pennsylvania - BS, Georgetown University - JD, University of Chicago - MBA

Occupation

Professor at DePaul University (4 years) Pro Bono Criminal Defense Attorney (sporadically from 2005-2020, although none while at the State’s Attorney’s Office), United States Navy Intelligence Officer (8 years)

Campaign website

newdayconway.com

Previous or Current Elected or Appointed Office

I have never run for political office, but I have volunteered on several Democratic political campaigns.

The single most pressing issue facing our (board, district, etc.) is _______, and this is what I intend to do about it.

The single most pressing issue facing our county is the gun crime epidemic. The citizens of Cook County deserve to live their lives without fear of violence in their commute to work or while playing outside, but we have an illegal gun problem that officials have failed to adequately address. In 2019, the Chicago Police Department seized more than 10,000 illegal guns — thousands more than the 7,000 seized in 2015. In order to really get after the gun crime epidemic we have to take a step back and look at disrupting the supply chain that brings all of these illegal guns to our streets. The State’s Attorney’s Office needs to track down the supply source all the way from the single gun recovery to significant gun trafficking.

Perhaps most importantly, we need to break the cycle of economic disinvestment that for far too long has allowed the gun crime epidemic to run rampant. Cook County citizens deserve to live in neighborhoods safe from gun violence.

What are the critical differences between you and the other candidates seeking this post?

I am a first time candidate running against Cook County’s entrenched political machine. Unlike my opponent Kim Foxx, when I am elected I will not owe anyone anything except the people of this county. It’s time for a change in the Cook County State’s Attorney’s Office and I have a plan to enact balanced criminal justice reform, get after our gun crime epidemic by disrupting the supply chain of illegal guns, and get politics out of the State’s Attorney’s Office.

If you are a challenger, in what way has the current board or officeholder failed the community (or district or constituency)

We need to focus on the unequal justice that is being administered in the Cook County State’s Attorney’s Office. We have seen a couple of instances where politically-connected people seem to be getting better deals than others. Kim Foxx gave Jussie Smollett an obvious sweetheart deal and we keep learning more about her deep ties to indicted Alderman Ed Burke. There is a two-tiered justice system where the politically-connected get better deals than everyone else.

Our county also needs a balanced criminal justice system. Right now we’re arresting people for gun crimes one day and releasing them the next, but at the same time there are nonviolent offenders who are getting locked up for being poor, addicted, or mentally ill. For far too long we’ve treated drug possession as a criminal problem and not the public health epidemic it is. Criminal justice reform must start with drugs, as drug cases constitute 40% of the felonies prosecuted in Illinois.

We cannot have criminal justice reform when there’s a two-tiered system of justice. If we want to create a system that works for everyone -- not just the rich and well-connected -- we need to make sure we’re keeping people in jail who are a danger to our communities without punishing people for being poor, addicted, or mentally ill.

Describe the other issues that define your campaign platform

I’m running for Cook County State’s Attorney to enact balanced criminal justice reform, disrupt the flow of illegal guns to our streets, and get politics out of an office where it never belonged.

Cook County citizens deserve a balanced criminal justice system. We don’t need to put people in jail who are not a danger to the community. We also don’t need to put people in jail for being poor, addicted, or mentally ill. But if somebody commits a violent crime with a gun, they should go to jail. We’re not getting that under our current State’s Attorney. I’ll take on the mass incarceration problem and make sure we are focusing on violent crimes. As State’s Attorney, I will implement these values from the top down and make sure our justice system has the right balance of dignity and safety.

I’m committed to getting after the gun crime epidemic we have here in Chicago by disrupting the supply chain that brings all of the illegal guns here. Last year in Los Angeles they had 254 murders. In New York they had 318 murders, but yet here in Chicago, a much smaller city, there were 492 murders. The Chicago Police Department seized more than 10,000 guns last year, by far more than any police department in any city in America, and much more than the 7,000 they were seizing just four years ago. We have to disrupt the supply chain by working our way from the person who commits a crime with a single gun all the way to the people that traffic in guns by the dozens and the hundreds.

The people of Cook County deserve a State’s Attorney who will guarantee justice for all, regardless of race, zip code, income level, or who they know. The most glaring example of the two-tiered justice system in the current administration is with Jussie Smollett, who managed to get 16 felony counts dropped after a politically-connected ally contacted Kim Foxx on his behalf. Meanwhile, my client Candace Clark was charged with the same crime as Smollett but doesn’t have the same powerful friends. Instead of getting her case dismissed for five minutes’ worth of a TV episode, Candace has to go to court every month, report to a probation office every month, maintain a job, pay restitution, and get permission from a judge if she wants to leave the county. We’ve also seen millions of dollars awarded to the corporate clients of well-connected officials like now-indicted Alderman Ed Burke, who held a fundraiser for Foxx before her office handed him the largest property tax settlement of her first 11 months in office. These acts of favoritism damage the public’s faith in the justice system and the basic operation of the office.

What accomplishments in your past would you cite as evidence you can handle this job?

I had a holistic and wonderful experience as an Assistant State’s Attorney in Cook County, working in misdemeanors, traffic, bond court and violent crime, although I spent the bulk of my time in the Public Corruption and Financial Crimes Unit of the Special Prosecutions Bureau (akin to major crimes). Some notable problems I tackled there include an armed robbery of a University of Chicago student at machine gun point, a welfare director in Hanover Township who embezzled $200,000 worth of welfare funds, and a police officer who befriended an older gentleman with dementia and put all of the victim’s assets into his name, among others.

I am an Intelligence Officer in the United States Navy and was most recently deployed to Qatar and Afghanistan to aid in discovering where the Taliban gets its money from and attack those sources so they could not buy weapons to attack our troops. In that role, I lead a team of 10 analysts and worked across the different military services of the U.S. and other nations and also worked collaboratively with various federal agencies including the CIA, DIA, DEA, State Dept and Treasury Dept.

If you win this position, what accomplishment would make your term in office as a success?

1. Getting after our gun crime epidemic.

2. Bringing about the public corruption reckoning that we have needed in Cook County for decades.

3. Fundamentally change the way drug possession is viewed from a criminal problem to a public health problem.

Why should voters trust you?

Most importantly, I am not connected to the Cook County Political Machine and can promise when elected that I will owe nothing to the Machine and everything to the voters who have placed their faith in me.

I also will bring new standards of integrity to an office where politics has ruled for far too long. I have a comprehensive ethics plan detailing how I will remove the influence of politics from the State’s Attorney’s Office, ensure all cases are treated the same regardless of who is involved, aggressively go after public corruption, and make the office more honest and transparent than it has ever been. I have a record to back me up — I served six years as an Assistant State’s Attorney and was a member of the Public Corruption and Financial Crimes unit, prosecuting officials who stole hundreds of thousands of dollars from local governments and securing convictions against multiple police officers who had abused their power.

What are your views on fiscal policy, government spending and the use of taxpayer dollars in the office you are seeking?

Every elected official needs to be a steward of taxpayer dollars. One thing we will have in the State’s Attorney’s Office is an affirmative litigation section of our civil division that will bring in money to the County and the State’s Attorney’s Office. In conjunction with this, I will advocate for a Cook County False Claims Act to allow for whistleblower lawsuits to combat fraud, waste and abuse.

Is there any reason you would not serve your full term of office, other than those of health or family?

There is no reason other than my health or family that I would not serve my full term of office. As for my military service, if elected I would be considered a “key employee” of the government and therefore non-deployable.

The best advice ever shared with me was …

What else would you like voters to know about yourself and your positions?

As a former Assistant State’s Attorney and Naval Intelligence Officer I know what weapons of war can do. Growing up in Chicago I have seen corrupt insiders and the political machine dictate how decisions are made. It’s far past time for a change in the State’s Attorney’s Office. We need to build a balanced criminal justice system, stop the flow of illegal guns, and remove politics from the State’s Attorney’s Office.