Bailey: "What Do You Have To Lose by Demanding Something Better?"
Former Senator Darren Bailey made his closing pitch to voters Monday. (Photo: Chicago Tribune)
On the final day of the fall campaign, Republican gubernatorial nominee Darren Bailey made his final pitch to voters, asking them to take a chance on Bailey’s underdog effort.
“Think about what’s left from your paycheck after the bills are paid. Then ask yourself, ‘what do you have to lose by demanding better,” he said at a news conference outside of Daley Plaza in Chicago. “JB Pritzker has had eight years. Eight years with the power of the Governor’s office and the legislature controlled by his own party. Before you give him four more, he ought to answer one simple question. What has he done to earn those four more years?”
Bailey has been vastly outspent by the billionaire Pritzker, who put more than $90 million of his own money into the cycle, burying Bailey in a barrage of television commercials, digital ads, and direct mail. Bailey struggled to raise money throughout the campaign and never aired a single TV ad.
Republican gubernatorial candidate and running mate Aaron Del Mar in downtown Chicago Monday. (Photo: Chicago Sun-Times)
Pritzker, who spent Monday on a fly around downstate, painted the conservative Bailey as an extremist out of touch with the beliefs of the mainstream.
“Let me be clear about the governor that I intend to be. I’m not going to Springfield to be an extremist,” Bailey said. “I’m going to Springfield to put more money in your pockets. You earned that paycheck and you deserve to keep it. I’m going there to make Illinois more affordable.”
Bailey lost to Pritzker by nearly 13 percentage points four years ago and most observers believe the gap will be wider by the time the votes are counted in this race.
