March 02--Mayor Rahm Emanuel on Wednesday drew unflattering parallels between the leadership styles of presidential candidate Donald Trump and Gov. Bruce Rauner, suggesting both Republicans tend to divide people rather than unite them.
The mayor was reacting to a question from a public radio reporter who said an Illinois delegate for Trump to the Republican National Convention told her there are similarities between the two men. "A Trump delegate said that? He clearly didn't get the talking points," Emanuel said.
"This is the first time at a press conference I'd like to say I'd like to go off the record," Emanuel said with a laugh as a dozen media members surrounded him on a stage after an expansion announcement at Chicago Shakespeare Theater.
The mayor's winding, 5 minute, 40 second response indicated an initial reluctance to wade into the politically fraught topic -- one that was overcome by his urge to take shots at a governor he has sparred with throughout the past year and a Republican front-runner who may soon be going head to head for the White House against Emanuel ally Hillary Clinton.
"Let me say, let me answer that question with a non-answer but a bigger point. Let me, here's what I will say: If you think Donald Trump -- I don't think Bruce Rauner, I'm not going to speak for him, would see that as a compliment," Emanuel said.
"But I will say this: Obviously the delegate must have been seeing something in the sense of this, which is I don't believe in division," Emanuel said. "We have enough challenges. You know my general view, which is just try to find common ground. Our party is going to come together backing Hillary Clinton, who's also not only going to bring our party together but try to bring our country together so that we together face our challenges and seize our future.
"The reason I'm opposed to Donald Trump's candidacy, there's a lot of reasons. One particular is because he is not only dividing the Republican Party, it's exactly how his presidency will be in dividing the United States," the mayor said. "And I won't say but you know, Illinois right now, while it had its divisions before, they have been exacerbated of late. And I would hope that we come together and move forward, and what I say by that, particularly as it relates to education of our children."
