The in box. George Schmidt. “Once the Vallas news came out by noon on Friday, the negative reaction from the CTU delegates and rank-and-file was unanimous.”

 

George Schmidt publishes Substance News.

Fred,

Pat Quinn was in danger of having the CTU sit out the last election, but Karen Lewis realized that the alternative then to Quinn was Brady — and we would have been near to being a Wisconsin.

So in early October, after a previous “no endorsement”, the CTU House of Delegates voted to endorse Quinn. Karen led that change, and I helped her with it

The last-minute CTU endorsement (and infusion of people and funds) was one of the reasons why Quinn won. Remember, he only won two (or perhaps three) counties out of the 101 in Illinois, and even Quinn will admit he won Cook County because of the “teacher vote.”

So now he has basically insulted all of us in Chicago’s schools and in the CTU.

There is no way the CTU’s 800-member House of Delegates will vote to support Quinn or spend any money on his re-election now that he had _______ (utilize your own creative metaphor for this excrement filled action on Quinn’s part) on our faces.

The real hit is to the newly revitalized CTU PAC fund. Last Wednesday we had done a lot to begin to convince delegates to up contributions to the PAC — and to take that message to the schools. During the two days after that House of Delegates meeting, most delegates didn’t have the time to go around and push PAC.

Once the Vallas news came out by noon on Friday, the negative reaction from the CTU delegates and rank-and-file was unanimous.

It will take some time for the union leadership to make it clear to the membership that our money won’t be going to Paul Vallas — or to “Quinn/Vallas.”

But given the number of people we want to elect, we can find lots of use for well organized political action. I live in Chicago’s 45th Ward (John Arena, alderman), and already Rahm has his candidate against John (see the blog “45th Ward Mom” — that’s Rahm’s candidate). But until it’s clear that not one penny of union money will go to Paul Vallas, I suspect that the PAC funds will be slow. Once it’s clear, then we can rebuild.

– George Schmidt