Rauner has “presided over a period of increased funding for K-12 education in Illinois”
From the Chicago Tribune:
Gov. Bruce Rauner’s re-election campaign has launched a new online ad featuring early childhood advocate Diana Rauner touting her husband’s efforts to improve state support of education.
The ad comes as the governor has summoned lawmakers back to Springfield for a special session to begin Wednesday after lawmakers held onto a bill they approved at the end of May to rewrite Illinois’ school funding formula. Hanging in the balance is whether the first state aid checks for the upcoming school year will go out as scheduled by Aug. 10.
… The governor’s new ad, titled “Diana on education,” shows Illinois’ first lady countering that assertion with an endorsement of her husband’s “passion for education.”
“We know how lucky we are to have the opportunities to help other people. And we treat it like a mission,” the first lady says as images of school buildings flash across the screen. “Bruce has increased education funding by $700 million. He increased early childhood education to its highest level ever. It’s about doing what’s right, not what’s easy. We’re doing this for our next generation.”
The governor has indeed presided over a period of increased funding for K-12 education in Illinois, but the boost in money also can be credited to lawmakers.
In 2015, Democrats passed an education funding bill as part of a broader spending plan for state government. Rauner vetoed all of the spending plan but the school appropriations, which provided a boost of about $275 million extra for schools and early childhood education programs.
Last year, Rauner and lawmakers cut a last-minute deal that granted funding to elementary and high schools and again increased the amount schools received compared with the previous year.
All told the past two years, schools have been granted an extra $751 million in general state aid and an additional $92 million for special programs. Early childhood education spending has been boosted by $121 million.
…The first lady, who has said she is a Democrat, heads the Ounce of Prevention Fund, a not-for-profit organization focused on early childhood education. Through her Ounce work, she developed an image as an advocate for kids long before her husband entered the political scene.
The last time that Diana Rauner lent her voice to her husband’s campaign was in fall 2014, after a government employee union-funded political action committee allied with then-Democratic Gov. Pat Quinn aired a TV ad that aimed at convincing voters Rauner was anti-woman.
Diana Rauner appeared in an ad telling voters that machine politicians were using “false, vicious attacks” to try to stay in power.
“Bruce doesn’t owe anybody anything, and that scares special interests,” she said. “But he’s smart, honest, successful — everything our state government isn’t.”
###
