Jesse Ruiz
Name: Jesse Ruiz
Age: 53
Party: Democratic
Current residence: Chicago
Current position: Partner, Drinker Biddle & Reath LLP
Past legal experience: 21 years at DBR (Gardner Carton & Douglas before 2006 merger)
Campaign funds available, July 1 to Dec. 31: $549,226.22
Campaign funds spent, July 1 to Dec. 31: $194,079.19
Law school: University of Chicago Law School, 1995
Campaign website: Jesse4IL.com
Family: Married to Michele Ilene Ruiz, partner at Sidley Austin LLP, with two sons
Hobbies/interests: Running
What would you consider your greatest career accomplishment?
I am very proud that I have been able to combine my work as legal counsel for a wide range of clients with a strong, consistent commitment to pro bono work and community service. I co-chaired our firm’s legal clinic and have consistently provided pro bono legal counsel to clients who could not otherwise obtain legal services, and I have also have provided counsel pro bono to a number of nonprofit organizations, such as the Erie Neighborhood House, Get in Chicago, the Metropolitan Planning Council and the Illinois Legislative Latino Caucus. I also have been an advocate for public education throughout my career, having served nearly seven years as chairman of the Illinois State Board of Education and more than four years as vice president of the Chicago Board of Education. In 2015, in the wake of a bribery scandal, I stepped in to become interim CEO of the Chicago Public Schools, the nation’s third-largest school district; during my brief tenure, I reformed the district’s sole-source procurement processes and brought new levels of oversight to bilingual programs in Chicago schools.
Why should voters support your candidacy?
My breadth of experience across all types of legal work and my commitment to pro bono legal services make me uniquely qualified to lead the Attorney General’s Office, which is often described as the largest public-interest law firm in the state and is responsible for providing legal oversight covering a broad range of issues, reaching every corner of Illinois. I became an attorney so I could use the law to protect and defend others and to be able to step in when people need a champion. As attorney general, I will work to bring the power of government back to the people of Illinois. Every day, I will work to make Illinois a better, safer place — for all of us.
What would be your top priority as attorney general?
The Illinois attorney general has jurisdiction over a wide range of issues, and it is impossible to predict with any certainty the issues that will be at the top of the agenda in January of 2019. I mean, who would have predicted this time last year that the Attorney General’s Office would be investigating Equifax — or that attorneys general from across the country would be banding together to protect our health care from attempted sabotage by the White House? But no matter what unexpected events and issues arise between now and the day I take office in January 2019, I know that three top priorities will guide the work of my office:
- Fighting public corruption
- Fighting for criminal justice reform
- Fighting against the Trump agenda of rolling back our civil and workplace rights, immigration policy and environmental regulations
Regarding the ongoing consent decree talks with the Chicago Police Department, what policies or measures do you view as being necessary for the department to adopt?
As the Attorney General’s Office hammers out the details of this long-overdue consent decree, it will be crucial to ensure that all stakeholders are heard and included in the process. Much of the onus will be on the police department to develop a new culture of openness and community accountability; building that culture will require a completely new approach to training and supervision. We also must work with community advocates and civil rights groups, to make sure that everyone in every neighborhood feels equally protected by the police force. Most importantly — given that this consent decree may shape the city’s police force for several decades — we must make sure that this consent decree is specific and stringent enough to assure the real, substantive change that is needed, but also is flexible enough to serve the needs of the people of Chicago for years to come.
How do you view the attorney general’s role in conjunction with the federal government?
It is the duty of the attorney general to stand as the front line of defense against attacks on the rights of the people who live here. All across the country, we are seeing state attorneys general taking aggressive action to block the overreaches of this anti-immigrant, anti-Latino, anti-woman, anti-Muslim administration. As the next Illinois attorney general, I will join — and lead — similar challenges to the Trump administration’s discriminatory and unconstitutional assaults on our civil rights.
Do you believe state employees should be paid absent an appropriation? Under the current laws of the state, would you go to court to block their pay if they continued receiving checks absent a budget?
The Illinois Constitution speaks clearly on this issue: “The General Assembly by law shall make appropriations for all expenditures of public funds by the state.” If the state cannot pay private contractors absent a legislative appropriation, even if they hold valid contracts, then it cannot pay wages without a budget and appropriation in place. As attorney general, I will act in accordance with the Illinois Constitution, and I will expect the next governor to follow the Constitution by introducing a balanced, timely budget that will ensure that all state employees and contractors are paid legally and appropriately.