Posted by Monique Garcia at 5:10 p.m.; last updated at 10:26 p.m. with Hynes response
Gov. Pat Quinn tonight accused opponent Dan Hynes of trying to "sow the seeds of racial divide" by airing a TV attack ad that features decades-old video of late Mayor Harold Washington saying it was a mistake to put Quinn in charge of the city’s revenue office.
Speaking to a predominantly African-American congregation at a South Side church, Quinn recounted how he stood by Washington and worked to help get him elected. He also brought up the political history of how Hynes’ father, 19th Ward power broker Tom Hynes, opposed Washington, Chicago’s first black mayor.
"(Hynes) and his father in the 1980s were standing against Harold Washington and everything he tried to do bring our city together, bring our state together. I was on Harold Washington’s side on every single election Tom Hynes and his son Dan were against Harold Washington," Quinn said. "They were part of the mass of resistance against Harold Washington, and I think that there’s a real choice for voters today not to go back to that, stand with me where I believe everyone’s in and nobody’s out."
Quinn said the ad is reason for voters to shun Hynes in the Feb. 2 Democratic governor primary.
"Are we going to have 11 days from today a governor who brings our state together or are we going to go back to what happened before I came along with a governor who’s dividing people? I don’t think we want that," Quinn said.
Hynes spokesman Matt McGrath tonight said Quinn "still doesn’t get it."
"This race isn’t about Tom Hynes, and it’s not about what Dan Hynes was up to as an 18-year-old college freshman," McGrath said. "The reason Mayor Harold Washington’s words resonate so much today is that his firsthand experience with Pat Quinn is so eerily similar to Illinois’ experience with him as governor. Mayor Washington had to fire Quinn for his lack of discipline, lack of planning, and incompetent management. Now the voters of Illinois are facing the same situation, and they ought to follow suit."
The governor’s comments came after Washington supporters called on Hynes to pull the ad at a news conference the Quinn campaign called as it continues to respond to the ad push. The spot is the latest escalation in a hard-fought battle for the Democratic governor nomination. It’s especially charged because of the city’s history of race and politics.
U.S. Rep. Danny Davis said Hynes’ ad is aimed at turning the black community against Gov. Quinn and is insulting to Washington’s memory because he’s not alive explain his comments.
Washington appointed Quinn to head the city’s revenue department, but later said he dumped him after Quinn “almost created a shambles in that department."
Hynes spokesman Matt McGrath said the campaign will not pull the ad because it directly speaks to Quinn’s poor leadership.
“The ad and the mayor’s words speak volumes and they are relevant today,” McGrath said.
Supporters of Quinn said the ad is in poor taste coming from Hynes. They pointed out Tom Hynes mounted a third-party campaign against Washington in his 1987 re-election campaign at a time when racial tensions ran high in Chicago politics.
U.S. Rep. Bobby Rush said the ad was an act of desperation on Hynes’ part, and he predicted it would cause a “blacklash” among African American voters.
“I say (the ad is) repugnant and irrelevant and (Hynes) should apologize not only to Pat Quinn, but to the African American community,” Rush said.