PICTURED L-R: Michael Crawford and State Rep. Mary Flowers
Says $500,000 can buy a lot of lies
Illinois’ longest-serving State Rep. Mary Flowers (D-31st) lost her bid for re-election on Tuesday, March 19th, to 41-year-old Michael Crawford. Flowers said Crawford, who was financially backed by Illinois Speaker Emanuel “Chris” Welch, is someone no one knows and who has done nothing for her district.
While the numbers were the lowest she has ever received in her 39 years, Flowers said, “I didn’t lose anything. Some strangers came in and purchased my seat for someone else, someone the people of the 31st District did not know, never heard of, and who never said what he would do for us to make our lives better. He never talked about our kids. He talked about his kids. He never talked about our families. He talked about his.
“This was outside interests who came in and took away the power from the people,” Flowers told the Crusader.
Earlier this year, Welch ordered Flowers, 72, to come to his office because he was angry that she talked about one of his white, male staffers questioning why he had changed his appearance to look like Hitler. Flowers refused, saying she didn’t want to get “cussed out” by the Speaker. She has known his staffer for more than 20 years and when she made those remarks; the now-former staffer just laughed.
An irate Speaker Welch took away Flowers’ leadership position and the accompanying $8,000 pay which set the stage for a dramatic turn of political events. Welch donated $560,500, plus more than $68,000 from his own political funds to back Crawford, an unknown educator with no political history.
With more than 80 percent of the votes counted, Crawford reportedly received 5,540 votes, 68.63 percent, to Flowers’ 2,532, or 31.7 percent. “I know voter turnout was low, but it has been low in the past, and I never received such a small vote,” she told the Chicago Crusader. “I will never believe those numbers.
“We are now living not in a democracy but an autocracy because these wealthy people from the outside came in and just robbed us of our freedom to express ourselves, to pick who we want to represent us, and they didn’t even leave their names, didn’t leave a calling card,” said Flowers, who has been in office for 39 years.
Flowers was talking about Welch’s reportedly getting the unions to back Crawford when they had been supporting her. “It’s a sad day. We are no longer independent thinkers. I have never seen so few people vote in the almost 40 years I have been in office. I find it hard to believe that only 2,000 came out and voted for me.
“Here, these people spent more than $500,000 for a total of 6,000 votes. Somebody needs to do the math,” Flowers said. “To spend $500,000 against me…really? Welch now runs the 31st District as well as the 7th District,” Flowers said, referring to his overseeing River Forest, Forest Park, Maywood, Broadview, Bellwood, Hillside, Westchester, LaGrange Park, and Berkeley.
“I think $500,000 can buy a lot of lies,” Flowers said. “Everything they said about me was a lie. I will never have the money nor the means to fight that. I will miss what I love to do in helping people, but life goes on. I am not looking for another job.
”I would not want to come back to Springfield again because it’s not the same,” Flowers stated. “I would never want to be in a place where the people who are there don’t know what their job is. My job is not to go along with Speaker Welch or anybody else. My job is to advocate on behalf of my constituents. If I’m no longer doing that, I really don’t have any business being there in the first place, not under this administration.”
