Mayoral candidate Gery Chico shares his vision for the mayor’s office with Big John & Ramblin’ Ray, including what he has in mind for rebuilding trust between neighborhoods and the police department. Chico also touches on how his relationship with Rahm Emanuel has grown and what he believes is the culprit of the city’s money issues.
Tag Archives: Rahm Emanuel
What have we learned today with Big John and Ramblin’ Ray? (9-11-18)
Big John and Ramblin’ Ray recap today’s show with ‘What did we learn today?’ a segment where they say what they’ve learned from the show. As well as asking Executive Producer Tony Lossano, Technical Producer Michael Garay, and Associate Producer Kimberly Kaczmarek what they’ve learned. Today’s show has Alderman Matt O’Shea on to talk about how he’s working with Bona Beef to help raise money to build The 9/11 First Responders Monument, before talking about Chicago’s mayoral race.
Visit Buona Beef at 10622 South Western Avenue from 10:30 am – 10 pm, to participate. Money raised from the Buona Beef event will be donated to “Raise the Beam” to cover the costs of the new 9/11 First Responders Monument.
Chicago Police to Document When They Point a Gun, Lori Lightfoot: “I think it’s necessary”
Big John and Ramblin’ Ray are accompanied by Chicago’s Mayoral candidate Lori Lightfoot, talking about the new policy that shall be coming next year where officers will have to radio in whenever they pull out their gun. Plus her thoughts on how to cut down the violence within Chicago.
What have we learned today with Big John & Ramblin’ Ray? (9-5-18)
Big John and Ramblin’ Ray recap today’s show with ‘What did we learn today?’ a segment where they comment on what they’ve learned from the show. As well as asking Executive Producer Tony Lossano, Technical Producer Michael Garay, and Associate Producer Kimberly Kaczmarek what they’ve learned. Today’s show covered Rahm Emanuel’s comments on how he won’t run for a third term as Chicago’s Mayor, and Bill Woodward’s book that Donald Trump calls a ‘bad book’.
Bill Cameron: ‘Wherever the big money goes, that’s the person who is likely to become mayor’
Big John and Ramblin’ Ray are joined by Bill Cameron, from Connected to Chicago, where they talk about Rahm Emanuel saying how he won’t be running for another term as Mayor. This leads to John, Ray, and Bill talking about each of the current candidates, breaking down which one of them would be fit for the position of Chicago’s Mayor.
Listen to Bill Cameron on Connected to Chicago, Sunday nights at 7 pm.
Gov. Bruce Rauner on Mayor Rahm Emanuel: ‘He’s got to go’
As Mayor Rahm Emanuel and Chicago Police try to calm down the city’s violence, President Trump and Governor Rauner are ratcheting up the rhetoric.
The first volley fired at Emanuel came Thursday morning, as governor Rauner called him corrupt. Speaking on a downstate radio station, Rauner claimed that Emanuel received $20 million from special interest groups.
“He’s corrupt. He’s part of the problem in Chicago,” Rauner said. “Failure on jobs. Failure on taxes. He’s got to go.”
Adam Collins, a spokesman for the mayor, said Rauner’s comments were “high praise” considering he was named the worst governor in America.
“He’s wrapping up a term in which he achieved nothing other than gridlock, and I guess desperate times call for desperate rhetoric,” Collins said.
Emanuel has faced calls to resign from Chance the Rapper and prominent Chicago pastor Reverend Gregory Livingstone.
Check out more at ABC7 Chicago.
President Trump blames the violence in Chicago on ‘bad leadership’
President Donald Trump slammed political leaders in Chicago on Thursday, blaming city officials for the weekend violence that left 12 people dead.
“I guess you have to take it from the leadership,” Trump said in Bedminster, New Jersey, where he was holding a meeting on prison reform. “It’s called bad leadership.”
In his remarks Thursday, the president did not name Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel, who served as President Barack Obama’s first chief of staff. Trump instead spoke broadly about the “bad stuff” happening in the city, and blamed its leaders.
“There’s no reason in a million years something like that should be happening,” Trump said.
The Emanuel administration, which has been repeatedly attacked by Trump during his nearly 20 months in the White House, chaffed at the barb from Trump.
“Bob Mueller’s investigation and Paul Manafort’s criminal trial must be getting to the president,” said Adam Collins, a spokesman for Emanuel. “We’re too busy working to continue reducing crime with police, community leaders, ministers and federal prosecutors to pay attention to his musings.”
The mayor said this week that “we as a city, in every corner, have an accountability and responsibility.”
“If you know who did this, be a neighbor,” Emmanuel said. “Speak up.”
Read more at USA Today.
Mayoral candidate McCarthy backs away from Trump criticism, says Emanuel’s ‘not doing his job’
Mayoral candidate Garry McCarthy went to Fox News again Tuesday morning, where he withdrew from his earlier criticisms of President Donald Trump while continuing to pound Mayor Rahm Emanuel for his manipulation of the Chicago violence.
During the morning segment, McCarthy was asked for a statement released on Monday in his campaign in response to recent support tweets from former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani.
In his statement on Monday, McCarthy said he was a “proud Democrat” and he did “I do not agree with the political views of Mayor Giuliani and I certainly remain opposed to the misleading and contradictory tone and policies by Donald Trump, I can not say how much it saddens me to see the “mayor of America” being with a president with whom I am diametrically opposed. ”
But Tuesday asked the cable TV station why it was so opposite to Trump, McCarthy said it was against political bias, not Trump’s politics.
“Well, it is not so much about the policies, but about the polarization that is happening in this country and in this city,” said McCarthy. “Rahm Emanuel is a polarizing figure and we have to reunite this city, and I think that the same problem is happening at the national level and we have to go after the president, we have to be together, we have policies that reflect our values. And it’s not so much that I’m against the president and his policies ̵ it’s more about the division that’s happening in this country – it’s heartbreaking for me. ”
Read more at remonews.com
Pat Quinn: two-term limit for Chicago mayors — including Rahm Emanuel
Big John and Ramblin’ Ray are joined by former IL. Governor Pat Quinn, who comments on his push for term limits on Chicago mayors. Stating he’s not pushing this because of any bad blood between him and Rahm Emanuel.
Chicago Mayoral Race: Does Rahm have something to worry about?
Big John and Ramblin’ Ray have Bill Cameron, from Connected to Chicago, join them this morning to comment on what Willie Wilson said about Rahm Emanuel. Plus a preview of what to expect this Sunday’s Connected to Chicago.
Listen to Bill Cameron on Connected to Chicago, Sundays at 7 pm on WLS-Am 890.
Connected to Chicago (05-13-2018)
Bill sits down with Peter Nolan. Peter is the author of “News Stories”. Bill and Peter discuss the book, Current Chicago politics and events, and also remember some of the most historically important news stories that have happened, which they both have covered in the news throughout the past.
In this week’s round table segment, Bill Cameron is joined by Greg Hinz of Crain’s, Ray Long of the Chicago Tribune, Lynn Sweet of the Chicago Sun Times, and Fran Speilman of the Chicago Sun Times. Topic’s include Lori Lightfoot announcing she’s running for mayor, The Mayoral Campaign overall, and How Historical Lincoln relics could be going to auction due to lack of financing for the presidential museum.
This week’s Connected to Chicago segment features Nick Gale and is with the Better Business Bureau about moving scams. The segment is with Steve J. Bernas, president and CEO of Better Business Bureau serving Chicago and Northern Illinois.
Common complaints included damaged or missing items, bills that were higher than estimates, late deliveries and in some cases, goods held hostage for additional payments.
More than 35 million Americans move each year and movers are one of the top categories of companies searched on the Better Business Bureau website, bbb.org.
Big John & Ramblin’ Ray 60 (seconds): Deerfield, lasagna, and flights
The Deerfield Village Board unanimously voted to ban some semi-automatic weapons, such as AR-15s. Theresa Thomas filed a lawsuit suing an Italian restaurant, claiming “piping hot” marinara sauce shot out of her lasagna without warning and caused severe burns on her hand. Mayor Rahm Emanuel was on a flight from London to Chicago that had an incident involving an inebriated woman, that he wasn’t even aware of.
Chicago to establish ID undocumented immigrants can obtain
CHICAGO (AP) — Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel is pushing the establishment of a municipal identification program that will allow people living in the U.S. illegally access to city services.
A proposed ordinance introduced Wednesday to Chicago’s City Council would allow the city clerk to review documents provided by applicants seeking an ID. However, the clerk’s office would be barred from collecting or keeping that information.
The measure is aimed at easing the fears of immigrants that President Donald Trump’s administration could use the information to try to track down and deport them.
Emanuel’s move comes as U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions threatens to withhold federal money from cities that don’t cooperate with federal immigration agents.
Emanuel on Wednesday downplayed the move as a response to the Trump administration’s illegal immigration crackdown. He says the ID will represent Chicago’s values as a welcoming city.
Copyright 2017 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
Chicago City Hall Releases Mayor’s Personal Emails
By Bill Cameron, WLS-AM 890 News
(CHICAGO) At Chicago City Hall, Mayor Emanuel has settled a freedom of information lawsuit with the Better Government Association by releasing thousands of pages of emails from his personal email account about public business.
No smoking guns in Rahm’s email dump, but his personal attorney was allowed to determine which emails would be made public.
Still, anytime anybody who gets Rahm to cave-in, it is interesting, and the mayor’s move is a step closer to the promise he made when he became mayor in 2011, “Everything we do will be fully transparent.”
But behind the scenes, at the hall, the mayor is angry that the Tribune apparently plans to continue to pursue legal action to let a judge rule on whether private emails involving members of the Emanuel family should be made public.
Chicago Aldermen Push to Remove Honorary Trump Street Sign
“It’s not like he just became controversial,” Ray Stevens said on Thursday morning.
During a press conference following Wednesday’s City Council meeting, Mayor Rahm Emanuel threw his support behind a proposed ordinance to remove a street sign on Chicago’s Wabash Ave. that honors Trump Tower, a neighboring building owned by Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump.
“We’ll put the sign back up when he releases his tax returns.” – Rahm Emanuel
Read the story from NBC Chicago here: Chicago Aldermen Push to Remove Honorary Trump Street Sign | NBC Chicago
Former City Hall insider gets 10 years in red-light camera scam
(CHICAGO) A former City Hall insider who rigged Chicago’s red-light camera program to favor crooked business executives from Arizona was sentenced to 10 years in prison Monday for his crime, the Chicago Sun-Times is reporting.
John Bills spent a decade pocketing piles of cash bribes, jet-setting across the country and living it up in chic hotels. It took a federal jury less than one day in January to convict him on 20 counts of fraud, extortion, bribery and other crimes.
The 10 years was what federal prosecutors have said he deserved — at minimum. They were open to more, but U.S. District Judge Virginia M. Kendall settled on that number.
Under federal guidelines, he faced up to 21 years and 10 months in prison.
U.S. Attorney Zachary Fardon represented the government at Monday’s sentencing hearing.
“This was a decade-long scheme to lie, cheat and steal at the expense of taxpayers,” he said.
But defense attorney Nishay Sanan laid out a laundry list of past public corruption sentences in Chicago for the judge, pointing to other appointed officials who received sentences well below the 10 years the feds sought for Bills.
Sanan asked instead for between five and seven years for his client.
“Mr. Bills is not ex-Gov. Blagojevich,” he said.
Then it was Bills’ turn to speak.
“I stand before you and accept responsibility for my unethical actions, poor decisions and unacceptable code of conduct,” he said.
“I have disgraced myself. … I have destroyed a career and reputation that spanned 32 years.”
Testimony at Bills’ two-week trial had revolved around cash bribes quietly passed in envelopes at Manny’s Deli and Schaller’s Pump, insider information revealed over drinks at the John Hancock Center and secretly recorded conversations hinting at a conspiracy at the center of Chicago’s much-maligned red-light camera program.
Bills used his role as assistant commissioner for the Chicago Department of Transportation to help Redflex Traffic Systems Inc. cheat its way into $131 million in red-light camera contracts between 2002 and 2011. In return, the company showered him with more than $18,000 in posh hotel stays, fancy dinners, computers, cigars and the use of a $177,000 Arizona condo.
It also hired a buddy of Bills’ to pass him $560,000 in bribes.
The feds put Bills’ three co-conspirators — former Redflex CEO Karen Finley, ex-Redflex Vice President Aaron Rosenberg and Bills’ pal Martin O’Malley — on the stand to help prove their case. Finley and O’Malley have pleaded guilty and have yet to be sentenced.
After Bills helped Redflex land its initial contract with the city in May 2003, Bills joined its team for a celebratory dinner in Los Angeles. Bills told Rosenberg “it was time for him to get his,” the former VP testified. Redflex then hired O’Malley for a customer services job because he was “John’s guy,” according to Finley. And O’Malley said he passed $560,000 of his bonuses and commissions to Bills.
Mayor Rahm Emanuel canceled Redflex’s contract in 2013 after the Chicago Tribune first published allegations about the bribery scheme.
Mayor, Friends of Parks, Working on Lucas Compromise
By Bill Cameron, WLS-AM news
(CHICAGO) Getting the Lucas Museum is apparently no longer a lost cause. Mayor Rahm Emanuel is trying to make a deal with the Friends of the Parks to end their lawsuit that’s blocking the big project.
Emanuel is reportedly trying to negotiate a settlement. Friends of the Parks would drop their lawsuit and the mayor would push their “Last Four Miles Plan” to extend the ring of lakefront park land all the way from Evanston on the north to the Indiana line on the south.
Emanuel is not denying it.
“I believe and I’m committed to to try and find a way that all of us in the city, that love this city, people of different views, can work together and have a situation where Chicago’s cultural plans and open space, which are part of who we are as a city, work together in enriching the city economically, culturally and educationally,” Emanuel said.
And the mayor was very careful not to say too much.
“I’m not taking questions. I have one answer for all the questions.”
So it’s unclear whether they’re negotiating to put the Lucas Museum back on a Soldier Field parking lot or trying to raise more than a billion dollars to re-purpose the McCormick Place Lakeside Center.
Listen to Bill Cameron’s report for WLS-AM 890 News here:
In a statement released shortly after the mayor’s comments, Friends of the Parks says it is still committed to preserving the lakefront and says they are not dropping the lawsuit.
@ 2016 WLS-AM News
Zopp Tapped as Deputy Mayor
By Bill Cameron, WLS-AM 890 News
(CHICAGO) Mayor Rahm Emanuel has appointed former Chicago Uban League president & unsuccessful Senate candidate Andrea Zopp to be a second deputy mayor for neighborhood development. Bill Cameron notes that the politics of this move are intriguing.
Emanuel is unpopular in the black community these days and so is he using Zopp as a $185,000 a year deputy mayor to help make him more popular? She denies it.
“I’m not here to be used, I’m hear to help continue to build our neighborhoods and our communities,” Zopp said. “I choose to be here because I’m passionate about this work and I’ve been doing this work for a long time.”
Or is Emanuel grooming her to run for mayor in 2019 because he’s decided he can’t be re-elected?
”Look, today I just started as the deputy mayor, I’m focused on doing that job.”
Asked directly if she would ever consider running for mayor, Zopp didn’t answer.
@ 2016 WLS-AM News
Friends of the Parks fights Rahm motion to dismiss Lucas museum lawsuit.
By John Dempsey, WLS-AM 890 News
(CHICAGO) The good government group trying to keep the George Lucas museum from being located on Chicago’s lakefront, is responding to Mayor Emanuel’s latest legal maneuver. Last week the city filed a motion to dismiss the lawsuit the group Friends of the Parks has filed. The group wants to keep the Lucas museum from any location on the lakefront.
Now, Friends of the Parks attorneys have filed their response, saying they deserve their day in court. The parks group says the Lucas plan violates laws restricting development along Lake Michigan, and the group says if it’s federal lawsuit is dismissed, it will take it’s case to state court.
However Emanuel says if that lawsuit goes forward, it increases the chances that George Lucas could run out of patience and locate his museum in another city. Emanuel wants to place the museum in the Bears parking lot south of Soldier Field, where he says it would be a massive shot in the arm for Chicago’s tourism industry.
The Mayor briefly proposed tearing down the portion of McCormick place east of Lake Shore Drive to locate the museum there, but Emanuel then returned to the original parking lot site when Friends of the Parks said it would oppose any location on the lakefront.
@ 2016 WLS-AM News
Emanuel to Court: Throw Out Lucas Museum Lawsuit
By Bill Cameron, WLS-AM News
(CHICAGO) Mayor Rahm Emanuel is going to court to try to save the Lucas Museum for Chicago.
Emanuel is asking the U.S. Court of Appeals to throw out the Friends of the Parks lawsuit that’s been blocking the Lucas Museum on a Soldier Field parking lot.
With George Lucas seriously looking at offers from other cities, the mayor is telling the court that time is off the essence.
Emanuel is also trying to isolate Friends of the Parks as the bad guys trying to spoil a billion dollar gem for the museum campus and shame them into making a deal to drop their lawsuit.
But if he loses, Emanuel told reporters it’s not a blow to him.
“I can’t stop you because you’ll say, in your way, this is my loss. Go ahead. I don’t really care how you do it,” Emanuel said. “Guess what? When your a mayor or an elected official, you’ve got to walk and chew gum. You’ve got to do them all. You don’t get to choose and pick and if you have an opportunity for nearly a billion dollars of economic development, you don’t just kind of be willy-nilly about it.”
@2016 WLS-AM News
Rahm Advice for Rauner
By Bill Cameron, WLS News
(CHICAGO) Mayor Rahm Emanuel is hitting back at Gov. Bruce Rauner’s recent jabs.
Rauner has been sliming Rahm lately, trying to get him to lean on Speaker Madigan to make a deal to trade a tax hike for some of the governor’s anti-union changes.
In response, Rahm is taking note of Rauner’s first anniversary in office this week.
“My recommendation is rather than pointing fingers at everybody else and talking about their work he should take the time to talk about his work and the accomplishments, or the lack there of, that would reflect the one year of his tenure,” Emanuel said.
And the mayor said the governor should stop the talk about giving Chicago schools less money instead of more, as the governor did taping Connected to Chicago for Sunday at 7 p.m.
@ WLS News 2015
Rauner: “Very disappointed” in Emanuel
By John Dempsey, WLS News
(CHICAGO) Republican Governor Bruce Rauner says he is “very disappointed” in his friend and former vacation partner, Democratic Mayor Rahm Emanuel, for Emanuel’s response to the police brutality crisis. Rauner spoke on Monday at a public appearance in Oakbrook, saying, “I am very disappointed in the Mayor, and in the State’s Attorney for Cook County, very disappointed. I’m not gonna say more than that right now, because there’s a lot of investigation going on, but I’m very disappointed.”
Emanuel and Cook County States Attorney Anita Alvarez have faced widespread criticism for their actions in the wake of the release of a video showing white Chicago Police Officer Jason Van Dyke, shooting black teenager LaQuan McDonald to death in October of 2014. In the wake of the release of the video, the U.S. Department of Justice has launched a civil rights investigation into the Chicago Police Department.
Rauner is not elaborating on specifically why he is disappointed in Alvarez or Emanuel, but during an appearance on “The Big John Howell Show” on WLS AM 890 Tuesday morning, he said Emanuel has not done enough to convince his fellow Democrat, Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan, of the need to enact Rauner’s pro-business reforms in the State Legislature.
“We’ve asked the Mayor to help publicly and openly to nudge the speaker to bring reforms. We need structural change. The Mayor has been helpful in background, in private, as has President Cullerton from the Senate. They’ve both been willing to come up with helpful ideas, they’ve both been willing to compromise and come up with interesting proposals, but when the speaker pushes back against them or ignores them, they don’t do anything. They just sit passively off in the side.”
Rauner also says as long as Emanuel fails to help lobby Madigan, Chicago cannot count on any help from the State in solving it’s pension crisis in the public school system.
The State is now entering it’s seventh month without a budget, because of the standoff between Rauner and Madigan. Rauner, who has said he would support an income tax increase, told WLS that will only happen if he is able to weaken labor unions and enact other pro-business changes in the State.
“I’m one of the most persistent people on the planet, and I’m just gonna stay strong and stay persistent. What we can’t do, and even the Democrats in the legislature, many of them agree, what we should not do is just pass a massive tax hike on the people of Illinois. Our taxes are already high and if that’s all we do to balance out of control spending in the state, that will chase more employers away, that will increase the cost of living for families.”
@ 2015 WLS News
Retrial Ordered for 2011 Police Shooting
By Bill Cameron, WLS News
(CHICAGO) Another day and Bill Cameron says another embarrassment for City Hall in the police brutality scandal.
This time it’s a federal judge ordering a new trial in another police killing case because one of the city’s top lawyers withheld evidence from the family of the victim and then lied about it.
It’s the latest black mark on the administration of Mayor Emanuel who predicted more bad news to the city council.
“It will be a bumpy road, make no mistake about it,” Emanuel earlier said. “It is a painful process. It is a long journey because of the issues we need to confront.”
Listen to Bill Cameron’s report for WLS news here:
And in this episode there is the suggestion there is a code of silence among city lawyers.
@ 2016 WLS News
Rauner: Recall Bill Might Not Remove Sitting Mayors
By Bill Cameron, WLS News
(OAK BROOK) Tough talk by Gov. Rauner aimed at Mayor Emanuel today in Oak Brook.
Bruce Rauner is all of a sudden saying he’s “very disappointed” in his pal Rahm Emanuel. So disappointed he says he’d sign that bill to recall Rahm.
“From what I’ve been told, I have not studied the bill that’s been proposed, but what I’ve been informed about it, based upon that, I would sign that bill,” Rauner said. “But I also think it’s important to understand what out attorneys, because I’ve been asking about this, what our attorneys have told me is that if any kind of recall bill passed it could not or would not apply to sitting elected officials, it could only apply to folks elected in the future.”
Listen to Bill Cameron’s report for WLS radio news here:
Rauner also said Rahm’s wrong to blame Springfield for the Chicago school crisis. And he said he wouldn’t bail out Chicago Public Schools without turnaround agenda reforms, even if teachers get laid-off by the thousands.
@ 2016 WLS News
Tasers Not Cure-all
By Bill Cameron, WLS News
(CHICAGO) Mayor Rahm Emanuel is ordering more tasers and more training to deal with police-involved shootings, but some are denouncing the move.
Leading African-Americans criticized Rahm’s move even before it was formally announced.
“Tasers kill also,” said State Rep. Mary Flowers (D-Chicago) “Just like guns, if you lay a gun down its not going to kill him but if it’s abused and misused it’s the same principle with tasers.”
“There will only be fundamental change on the issue of discipline if there are consequences for misconduct,” said Jesse Jackson.
It’s not so much the weapons that are in the hands of our officers but their attitudes towards the people that they’re serving,” said Cook County Board President Toni Preckwinkle.
So it looks like the mayor is not getting out in front of the police scandal just yet.
@ 2015 WLS News
