{"id":480003,"date":"2010-03-27T11:25:07","date_gmt":"2010-03-27T15:25:07","guid":{"rendered":"tag:typepad.com,2003:post-6a00d8341c60fd53ef0133ec421863970b"},"modified":"2010-03-27T14:56:45","modified_gmt":"2010-03-27T18:56:45","slug":"democrats-pick-simon-as-quinns-running-mate","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/480003","title":{"rendered":"Democrats pick Simon as Quinn’s running mate"},"content":{"rendered":"

UPDATE 1:55 p.m.\u00a0by Rick Pearson and Ray Long: Turner encourages Democrats to stay engaged.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

State Democratic Party leaders today selected Sheila Simon, the daughter of the late Sen. Paul Simon, to be Gov. Pat Quinn’s running mate in the general election.<\/div>\n
\u00a0<\/div>\n
State Rep. Art Turner of Chicago came in second for the nomination.<\/div>\n<\/p>\n

Simon won in the first round of balloting by the 38-member Democratic State Central Committee, after she and about a dozen other finalists presented their credentials. <\/p>\n

Simon was Quinn’s choice and he gave her a hug as soon as the vote was over. <\/p>\n

"Sheila Simon is someone who I think is very special to this state," Quinn said.<\/p>\n

Quinn also thanked Turner, who came in second in the Feb. 2 primary election and was supported by a busload of people who came down from Chicago for today’s meeting.<\/p>\n

The winner needed to get 50 percent of the weighted vote cast by the Democratic State Central Committee members based on the votes cast in each congressional district in the Feb. 2 primary\u2014a number equaling 959,522 votes. <\/p>\n

Simon got 1,092,845 weighted votes from committee members to Turner\u2019s 581,813. <\/p>\n

Raja Krishnamoorthi, who ran and lost in the Democratic primary for comptroller and then switched his sights to lieutenant governor, got 56,999 weighted votes while Dirk Enger, a DuPage County Board member, got 27,733.<\/p>\n

Michael Madigan, the state Democratic Party chairman and powerful Illinois House speaker, did not cast the weighted votes from his 3rd Congressional District on Chicago’s Southwest Side and suburbs. Madigan said he would have cast them if a second ballot was needed, but declined to say for whom he would have cast the votes. <\/p>\n

Simon also was boosted when the weighted votes of U.S. Rep. Bobby Rush were cast for her instead of Turner.<\/p>\n

Some African-American politicians had warned Quinn could face a backlash from black voters for not endorsing Turner.<\/p>\n

"I want to encourage people to still keep in mind the Democratic Party and what it stands for," Turner said after the vote. "And so, what happens today should not discourage people from voting, from participating in the process."<\/p>\n

Turner acknowledged that it hurt to lose after a long battle, which included\u00a0preparations for the\u00a0primary campaign, the second place loss to Scott Lee Cohen, and the new hope when Cohen dropped out over his controversial past.\u00a0"It may hurt a little bit…I’m prepared for this," Turner said.<\/p>\n

"I’m glad it’s over.\u00a0The committee made their selection and I will go forward."<\/p>\n

Simon, who taught Turner\u2019s son at Southern Illinois University, said she voted for Turner in the primary but said circumstances had changed with the lieutenant governor vacancy.<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u201cThe leaders of the party had an opportunity to select a candidate based on what we know about the rest of the ticket and what\u2019s going on now,\u201d Simon said.<\/p>\n

Quinn and Simon say her downstate roots will help balance a Chicago-centric ticket for the November general election, as well as bring pro-reform credentials in\u00a0the\u00a0first election since\u00a0the ouster of\u00a0Rod Blagojevich following corruption charges.<\/p>\n

Earlier in the day, Quinn touted the experience advantage he said the Democrats would have over Republicans in the November election.<\/p>\n

"I think Sheila Simon has more experience in her little finger than the other candidate from the other side," Quinn said at the Capitol.<\/p>\n

Quinn’s barb was aimed at Jason Plummer, the 27-year-old GOP lieutenant governor nominee from Edwardsville. Plummer is a former Madison County Republican chairman who is an executive in his family’s lumber yard chain. <\/p>\n

Simon, 49, is a\u00a0former county assistant prosecutor, former member of the Carbondale City Council and works now as a law school teacher at Southern Illinois University at Carbondale. She lost a bid for Carbondale mayor several years\u00a0ago.<\/p>\n

"She’s a very accomplished person," Quinn said. "She’s done great things in her life and made a difference in the lives of a lot of other people.<\/p>\n

Originally posted <\/em>by Rick Pearson at 10:25 a.m.<\/p>\n

Democratic leaders are meeting in Springfield today to select a running mate for Gov. Pat Quinn and more than\u00a0half a dozen finalists get to make their case before the votes are cast by the 38-member Democratic State Central Committee.<\/p>\n

Gov. Pat Quinn announced yesterday<\/a> that he wants his colleagues to pick Sheila Simon, a former Carbondale councilwoman\u00a0and daughter of the late Democratic U.S. Sen. Paul Simon. But state Rep. Art Turner of Chicago is also trying to sway the committee, arguing he should get the job because he came in second in the Feb. 2 primary for the Democratic nomination.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

Dozens of Turner supporters arrived in a bus at the Springfield banquet hall before the 11 a.m. start of the meeting.\u00a0Turner is African-American, and black political leaders have suggested Quinn risks snubbing a key Democratic constituency with his choice of Simon. <\/p>\n

Quinn and Simon say her downstate roots while help balance a Chicago-centric ticket for the November general election, as well as brining pro-reform credentials in\u00a0the\u00a0first election since\u00a0the ouster of\u00a0Rod Blagojevich following corruption charges.<\/p>\n

The vote of the 38-member committee is weighted to reflect how much of the primary vote was cast in each of the state’s 19 congressional districts.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

UPDATE 1:55 p.m.\u00a0by Rick Pearson and Ray Long: Turner encourages Democrats to stay engaged. State Democratic Party leaders today selected Sheila Simon, the daughter of the late Sen. Paul Simon, to be Gov. Pat Quinn’s running mate in the general election. \u00a0 State Rep. Art Turner of Chicago came in second for the nomination. Simon […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3992,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-480003","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/480003","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3992"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=480003"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/480003\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=480003"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=480003"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=480003"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}