UPDATED AT 9:15 p.m. ; originally posted by David Heinzmann and Monique Garcia at 7:33 p.m.
In their last televised debate tonight, Gov. Pat Quinn and state Comptroller Dan Hynes spent most of an hour calling each other incompetent, a sign of increased tension in the final week of a tight race for the Democratic primary for governor.
While both politicians profess to have the answers for Illinois’ future, much of the rancor during the debate on WTTW-TV focused on distant history in Chicago politics. The two Chicagoans argued over Hynes’ ad featuring old television news footage of the late Harold Washington, Chicago’s first black mayor, explaining why he dumped Quinn as an aide.
And after Hynes vowed to fix the state’s pension system by rooting out abuses, including double dipping, Quinn accused his rival’s father, Tom Hynes, of taking multiple pensions stemming from his various jobs as a longtime state legislator and former Cook County assessor.
“His father’s a double-dipper, I don’t think that’s right,” Quinn said.
The Hynes campaign acknowledged Tom Hynes’ multiple public pensions, but the comptroller accused Quinn of being “disoriented” for attacking his father, who has been out of office for more than a decade.
Quinn has been reacting to the Washington ad for days, at times accusing Hynes of race-baiting, but also pointing out that an 18-year-old Dan Hynes appeared in an ad for his father, who temporary split from the Democratic party in 1987 to oppose Washington’s reelection bid for mayor. Quinn said Hynes and his father were “trying to take out Harold Washington.”
The governor also defended his tenure as revenue director for Chicago, saying people in Washington’s administration asked him to do unethical things, such as giving businesses breaks on paying their taxes. Caught in a fight between Washington aides who variously contended he was either too reform-oriented to deal with administration friends or too interested in seeking the media spotlight, Quinn was ousted after eight months.
Quinn said he was preparing to resign the office when Washington asked him to leave over a “different management philosophy.”
Hynes stood by the ads, saying Washington fired Quinn for allegedly mismanaging an office tasked with fiscal oversight, an issue at the center of Illinois’ current crisis.
“I think the words of Mayor Washington are very powerful,” Hynes said. “They tell a story.”
The candidates also argued again over Hynes’ level of responsibility in the Burr Oak Cemetery scandal, with Quinn alleging the comptroller’s office ignored numerous complaints about irregularities at the south suburban graveyard. Hynes countered that the comptroller’s office had very limited oversight restricted to auditing cemetery finances.
The candidates spent very little of the debate discussing issues facing the state. Even in response to questions about the budget mess and other hot-button issues—gay marriage, video gambling—the candidates quickly attacked each other.
At one point, moderator Carol Marin asked the candidates to exchange compliments. Quinn struggled, saying “I think anybody who gets in the (political) arena deserves credit,” but then slicing back at Hynes with accusations he used the comptroller’s office to undermine the governor politically. Quinn also refused to say he’d support Hynes in the general election if the comptroller wins on Feb. 2.
Hynes lauded the governor’s commitment to veteran’s issues, and said he would fully support Quinn if he ends up being the candidate.
“I’m very concerned about what the Republicans are saying about cuts,” Hynes said.
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Gov. Pat Quinn and state Comptroller Dan Hynes traded charges of incompetence tonight in a televised debate with a week to go in their tight race for the Democratic primary for governor.
The debate on WTTW-TV began with the two Chicago politicians arguing over Hynes’ ad featuring old television news footage of the late Harold Washington, Chicago’s first black mayor, explaining why he fired Quinn as an aide.
Hynes contended it showed Washington firing Quinn for "incompetence and mismanagement", adding "that’s what we got" from Quinn’s first year as governor.
Quinn responded that he quit the Washington administration at the mayor’s request because he was in a dispute with the mayor’s chief of staff, and without giving specifics Quinn implied that he was under pressure to give breaks to people with political connections.
Quinn, as he has before on this topic, asserted that Hynes and his father, former state lawmaker and county assessor Tom Hynes, encouraged racial division when the elder Hynes ran as a third-party candidate against Washington in his 1987 re-election campaign. At the time racial tensions ran high in Chicago politics.
Quinn hit Hynes again over the comptroller’s limited role in overseeing cemeteries, saying he "completely dropped the ball" on the Burr Oak Cemetery scandal in which cemetery workers are accused of digging up bodies and re-selling graves.
"He was incompetent," Quinn said.