PEORIA, Ill. – State Senator and Republican Gubernatorial candidate Darren Bailey says he thinks he can get votes in Chicago in the November election.
Bailey, speaking to several dozen supporters at the Lariat Steakhouse in Peoria Tuesday, says he’s spent a lot of time in the Chicago area since before the June primary, and thinks he’s making headway there.
“(I was on) Michigan Avenue just last week, as we were leaving town, cars are pulling up. We walked down Michigan Avenue with our families, nobody had anything (campaign-related) on. People are coming up…’I want our picture taken. You got the win,’” said Bailey (R-Louisville)
Bailey says he and his wife have had an apartment in the Aurora area, and are now looking at an apartment in Chicago.
“We have been immersing ourselves in the churches and the culture of Chicago,” said Bailey. “(Chicago voters) have been taken advantage of, lied to so much. They’re disenchanted. When they hear us the first time, they sense a message of hope, and they invite us back, and it’s pretty awesome.”
Bailey gives some of that credit to his running-mate, Stephanie Trussell, a Chicago native and former radio talk show host there.
Bailey had, at one point, said the city was a “hellhole” because of its ongoing gun violence problem — a point he reiterated during at least one gubernatorial debate in Chicago prior to the June primary.
