Willie Wilson Will Vote For Garcia...But May Endorse Emanuel

By Lisa White in News on Mar 2, 2015 4:15PM

Photo: Facebook

Former mayoral candidate, businessman, Hardball with Chris Matthews guest and House music remix subject Willie Wilson is speaking out about the upcoming runoff election and who he'll be voting for and endorsing on April 7. Which oddly enough isn't the same person.

In an interview with CBS 2's Dana Kozlov, Wilson declared that he'll vote for Garcia, due to his dissatisfaction with the public school closings under Rahm Emanuel's leadership and also because the city's red-light camera program. “My personal vote is for anybody except for this mayor,” Wilson told Kozlov. Wilson's statement to CBS 2 comes after a lunch Sunday with Garcia, a meeting on Saturday with Emanuel and two dozen African-American community and religious leaders (Wilson asked for the mayor to attend the meeting and he obliged because hello, runoff endorsement) and a meeting over the weekend between Wilson and Gov. Bruce Rauner, who has a history with Emanuel.

So, obviously that means Wilson is endorsing Garcia, since he is telling the more than 50,000 people who voted for him last week that he believe Garcia is personally the best candidate, right? Eh, not exactly. We know. It makes no sense.

Wilson shared the news that he could end up publicly endorsing Emanuel, it all depends on what members of his own community advise him to do. And he's insisting that his personal vote is separate from his endorsement.

Politically you might want to reconcile these two viewpoints before speaking to the media. Wilson "thinks people are smarter than that" and will be able to separate his personal choice for candidate from the one he publicly endorses. But even if he does publicly endorses Emanuel, knowing he is voting for Garcia will likely factor into the choice of some voters who backed Wilson and will head to the polls on April 7. No matter what, it feels more like a stamp of approval all around for Garcia.

At the end of the day it is just another mixed message from a candidate that mainly kept our attention with his bizarre behavior rather than his sound political choices. We think Scott Smith summed it up perfectly this morning.

You simply can't have it all, Willie.