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You remember Paul Vallas, right? He was Daley's CEO of the Chicago Public Schools from 1995 through 2001, until he left CPS amid criticism from the mayor and a new teacher's union leader who ran on an anti-Vallas platform. After coming in second to Blagojevich in the Democratic primary, Vallas left town to become CEO of the Philadelphia public schools. He's been running the New Orleans since 2007.
Now Vallas, who initially agreed to stay in NOLA through the 2009-10 school year, wants to run for Cook County Board President. As a Republican. In an exclusive interview with Carol Marin, Vallas said he's setting up an exploratory committee to look into the possibility of raising money and building support. "I wouldn't be setting up a committee if I wasn't going to run," Vallas said. "If the support is there, I'll do it."
Although the current county board president, Todd Stroger, is unpopular with voters, Vallas faces a crowded field of candidates, including Republicans Tony Peraica and Matt Murphy, the State Senator from Palatine who helped oust Rod Blagojevich. And if Stroger doesn't survive the primary, politically, Vallas could face a host of Democratic challengers, including Forrest Claypool, county sherriff Tom Dart, county assessor James Houlihan, county circuit court clerk Dorothy Brown and alderman Toni Preckwinkle. "Cook County is broken, and I like fixing things that are broken," Vallas said. "I've really been an independent reformer. In Philadelphia and New Orleans, I worked for Republicans."
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I guess all my knee-jerk Republican-hating friends will have to take back all those nice things that they said about Vallas over the years. This should be interesting....
worked for Republicans, and got run out on a fucking rail from Phily, after he flopped even harder than his failures here. Now he's running the same worthless plays in NOLA that didn't work here or in Philly, and he's ducking out before the numbers come in to show that he still doesn't know what he's doing. How the fuck does this idiot get hired for anything?
I don't see the Toddler making it through the primary, so I don't see why Vallas won't run on the Dem side. I still wouldn't vote for him, but I think switching teams really won't help him either.