GOP Committeeman Claar explains donations to Democrats

Dave Diersen drew attention this morning to two donations the 13th CD Republican State Central Committeeman Roger Claar made to Democrats within the past year.  Claar is the longtime mayor of far west suburban Bolingbrook, and just recently was appointed to represent the 13th District to the IL GOP'S State Central Committee, succeeding State Senator Kirk Dillard in that spot.

Illinois Review asked Committeeman Claar about these donations -- one to Democratic congressional primary candidate Jerry Bennett against 3rd CD incumbent Congressman Dan Lipinski  and another to the DuPage Democratic group ACTBLUE, and here's verbatim what Mayor Claar told us . . .

I have been a personal friend of Mayor Jerry Bennett for over 20 years.  He has served as Mayor of Palos Hills for 28 years.  He is considered one of the great mayors of Illinois as evidenced by his current presidency of the Illinois Municipal League, his current Chairmanship of newly created Chicago Metropolitan Agency for planning, and past presidencies of several similar organizations. 

He told me about a year ago he was going to challenge Congressman Dan Lipinski in the primary this past March and ask for my support.  Mayor Bennett would make a much better Congressman because of his awareness of the many issues facing American Cities, and I certainly hoped he would win!   

Given Lipinski's incumbency, it was difficult for Mayor Bennett to raise comparable funds to fund his campaign to win the primary.  I contributed $l,000 through ACTBLUE to his campaign for at the time he called me, he did not have a credit card apparatus established to take on line donations.  ACTBLUE did and credited his campaign for the $l,000.  There was only one donation of $l,000.

Mayor Bennett did not win the primary and it appears Congressman Lipinski will win the November election by probably 70% plus since it is a solid Democratic district and everyone knows that.  If we couldn't beat former Congressman Lipinski's son Dan who replaced the Congressman a couple of years ago in a wide open primary and general, I don't believe we could do it now either.

My donation was for Mayor Bennett to win the primary.  Would I have done it for the general?  I guess we'll never know!

No big deal?  Unacceptable coming from a state central committeeman who is elected to represent him to the IL GOP by party leaders? or move on, nothing to see here . . . ? 

What's your thoughts?

Comments

Skip's a SCC too. Claar didn't do anything Skip hasn't done many times.

[Michelle]

What's that mean? That because Skip Saviano does it, it's okay? If Joe Schmoe does it, that's one thing, but these guys argued against direct elections saying they didn't want Democrats pretending to be Republicans to get elected to SCC. What a joke!
Rejecting direct elections wasn't to protect the party from Democrats, it was to protect GOP elitists from losing their perception of political influence.

Claar needs to be reprimanded and a real Republican first needs to be put in that spot. Same goes for Saviano, and any other Republican leader that gave money to Democrats. Aiding and abetting the enemy used to be considered treason. Now its good politics?

Come on . . .

[Quiet Reflections]

Roger probably figured that it was worth a $1,000 to help out an old friend who is swimming against the current when it comes to defeating and getting rid of Lipinski. Probably not the most direct route to getting rid of someone that one considers inept and incompetent but it does work just the same. I can understand Roger's decision.
I have always been impressed and amazed at the enormous amounts of money that Roger Claar has always been able to raise for himself in the way of campaign contributions. Roger probably could help Jerry Bennett the most by serving on Jerry's financial committee. Roger seems to have a talent and an enormous ability to convince businesses and people to open their wallets to help him out financially. It is quite impressive.
I doubt that Roger (or anyone else) would want to be compared to Skip Saviano in regard to anything related to politics.