Mendoza picking the person she’d allow to replace her as comptroller

I happened to be watching the “Chicago Tonight” program (one of the few local news shows worth watching, by the way) this week, when Illinois Comptroller Susana Mendoza used political-speak to make it known she’d like to be Chicago mayor.

MENDOZA: Picking her post?

The one-time state representative, city clerk and state comptroller has been talked up as a mayoral candidate in the 2019 election cycle – even though she’s on the ballot for the Nov. 6 election for re-election to her state government post.

REPUBLICAN PARTISANS, LARGELY because they don’t have any legitimate objections to her, are trying to make an issue of her political future. They think Mendoza needs to state declaratively now and forever what her intentions are.

They’re trying to make people think it’s an outrage if Mendoza gets elected comptroller, then gives up the post in May IF she were to become elected mayor. Even though this kind of back-door dealing often occurs, and among candidates of both major political parties.

It is why I actually can accept Mendoza’s explanation every time she’s asked by someone who hopes to be the one who puts her “on the record” as to her political intentions.

Her answer usually is something along the lines of she’s focused on running for re-election, with her future to be decided some time in the future. It’s true enough, insofar as it goes.

Preckwinkle could fight with Mendoza … 

BUT THIS WEEK in speaking with the PBS affiliate, Mendoza said she’d be Illinois comptroller so long as Bruce Rauner is governor. Because she sees her filling of that political spot as a watchdog to the governor’s ideological desires.

With her as comptroller, she can impose a check – of sorts – on Rauner and all of his anti-organized labor desires.

Should Rauner manage to be dumped from office in the Nov. 6 elections and leave the governor’s mansion come January, she’d then feel free to contemplate leaving the post that she has held for just over two years to consider running for another office.

… for mayoral votes, as could Chico

Such as mayor, where she’d have some serious competition but also the support of activist types who’d love to see a Latina on the ballot or a younger woman – if noth both.

FOR IT IS those activist-types who are circulating the nominating petitions meant to show support for a Mendoza candidacy. Thereby allowing Mendoza to accurately say she’s not pushing herself for the mayoral post.

Of course, if she truly were opposed to having people talk her up as mayor, she’d have done something along the lines of Jesus Garcia, the Cook County Board member likely to win a seat in Congress next month. When those same activists tried circulating “Chuy for alcalde” petitions, Garcia made it clear he doesn’t want to run for mayor.

They then took up the cause of a Mendoza mayoral bid, and it seems the notion of returning to City Hall appeals to her ego. She could very well start actively campaigning for mayor the moment next month’s Election Day is over.

Admittedly, she’d have some heavy hitters to run against, such as William Daley, Toni Preckwinkle and Gery Chico (the latter of whom would likely be challenging her for the Latino segment of the Chicago electorate).

BUT IN THE same way that the mayoral dreams of Amara Enyia are being backed by people interested in a black woman, but who think Preckwinkle (at 71) is an old lady, there also likely are those who think Chico (at 62) ought to think of retiring and leave the job to the 46-year-old Mendoza.

Could they all clear the way for Daley

Of course, all this kind of political “logic” could be what causes the candidates to knock each other out and clear the path for a “Daley III” mayoral  term for William.

But with the Rauner campaign appearing to run these days on desperation and fantasy, perhaps Mendoza thinks it’s getting safe to hint she’d like to be mayor. If J.B. Pritzker could be the one who replaces her as state comptroller until a special election could be held in 2020, she wouldn’t be abandoning her post.

Mendoza is sitting pretty. She could take a crack at becoming “Latina Jane” (an allusion to Byrne, Chicago’s first female mayor). And if, by chance, she were to run for mayor and fall short, she’d have her comptroller’s to fall back on through 2022.

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