11th Hour Dirty Politics Report

Proft Responds to False and Illegal Robocalls; McKenna Responsible?

January 29, 2010

Conservative Republican gubernatorial candidate Dan Proft today responded to false robocalls from his one of his opponents,

This morning our office received a call from Bill Lad, one of our supporters in Chillicothe. Mr. Lad told us he received a robocall yesterday purporting to be me where the impersonator said that I had dropped out of the race and was supporting the ticket of Andy McKenna and Matt Murphy.

Our campaign also received an inquiry on the same topic from a Chicago news station after they received an email inquiring about the same call that Mr. Lad received.

Not only are these calls obviously false; they are illegal.

Beyond the illegality of someone impersonating me (and doing a poor job no doubt), under current Illinois election law, robocalls must clearly identify who paid for the call and the robocall vendor must document who paid for the call. The purpose is to eliminate the kind of criminality it appears that at least one of my competitors engaged in. Apparently the parties behind this tactic don't have the guts to put their names on it. I catch my share of heat for my pointed criticisms of opponents, but at least my critiques are of a substantive, policy nature and I put my name on them. You know where I stand.

We invite anyone who has received such a call to inform us and we continue to investigate the source of this criminal action so that we may file an appropriate and complete complaint with the Illinois State Board of Elections for further investigation.

The first question is, of course, who benefits from this call?

Given McKenna’s repeated ethical breaches and general gutless behavior, he has lost the benefit of the doubt. It was our campaign that obtained and made public a poll that Andy McKenna had done for his benefit while ILGOP Chairman that was in violation of State GOP ethics rules. Thanks to our disclosure, the State GOP did an investigation that led to McKenna admitting to and apologizing for this ethical lapse. Subsequent to that, it was our campaign that brought to light McKenna’s illegal fundraising. McKenna has raised tens of thousands of dollars from individuals who, under new campaign finance laws, are precluded from making campaign donations to gubernatorial candidates because they do more than $50,000 in business with the State of Illinois. McKenna has still yet to say whether or not he will return the illicit donations.

However, I cannot yet say definitively that McKenna or his minions were responsible for this action, there is at least one other candidate who would benefit if GOP voters mistook these counterfeit calls for the truth. And the old misdirection play is nothing new in Illinois politics.

But I will not mince words when it comes to Andy McKenna. As GOP Party Chairman, he was an unmitigated disaster. As a candidate, he is coward. As a Republican, he is a cancer.

I ask for each campaign for the Republican gubernatorial nomination to state definitively that they had no knowledge of, or participation in, this illegal act.

Turning Springfield upside down begins with turning the staid, discredited GOP establishment upside down as well.

There's been a lot of inauthentic communications during this campaign. Fake farmers, pretend board room scenes, etc. You know the drill.

But here's an authentic message to the Illinois GOP electorate from the real Dan Proft: You have a chance to bring policy revolution to this state through a campaign that has the guts to hit the establishment head on, and not engage in juvenile whisper campaigns and fake bravado.