While central Illinois Republicans State Sen. Darren Bailey (R-Xenia) and U.S. Rep. Mary Miller (R-Oakland) basked in the endorsement of former President Donald Trump Saturday before a crowd of thousands near Quincy, it was Miller’s verbal slip-up which immediately went viral.
Miller thanked Trump for completing a right-leaning U.S. Supreme Court which Friday overturned Roe v. Wade, calling the justices’ decision “a victory for white life.” The Miller campaign said Miller stumbled over a script which said “victory for right-to-life,” and you can hear Miller apparently catching herself between the words “white” and “life.”
Miller and another incumbent, U.S. Rep. Rodney Davis (R-Taylorville), are fighting one another in Tuesday’s primary in the newly drawn 15th Congressional District, which sprawls across downstate, east to west and northwest to southeast.
Saturday’s real news belonged to State Sen. Darren Bailey (R-Xenia), one of six Republican gubernatorial hopefuls Tuesday. Trump said Bailey enjoys the respect of the entire Illinois State Senate in giving Bailey his endorsement.
While Trump ripped Gov. JB Pritzker and U.S. Rep. Adam Kinzinger (R-Channahon), he made no mention of Davis nor of the other five candidates for governor, sparing them insulting nicknames which Miller and Bailey might have used in the final three days of the campaign.
As for the rest of the one-hour program, it sounded like a Trump 2024 presidential campaign speech, bypassing much Illinois-centric subject matter in favor of the 2020 election, which Trump says was rigged against him; how the “fake news” media should concentrate on threats to U.S. Supreme Court justices rather than the January 6 hearings; and transgender women competing in sports against people who have been female since birth.
The speech ended in the early stages of Saturday night’s thunderstorm.