Navy veteran Bill Conway challenges Kim Foxx for States Attorney
Former Afghanistan military veteran Bill Conway enters the race to unseat controversey-plagued Cook County States Attorney Kim Foxx who intervened to protect hoaxster Jussie Smollett. Conway is considered the leading challenger to Foxx.
By Ray Hanania
Navy Intelligence officer and military veteran Bill Conway announced thisa week that he will run for Cook County States Attorney to unseat the controversy-plagued incumbent, Cook County States Attorney Kim Foxx.
Foxx has come under criticism for intervening to help her friend, TV celebrity Jussie Smollett, who orchestrated a fake assault in order to obtain publicity to help his failing TV career.
Community leaders from across Cook County have also criticized Foxx for her failed efforts to prosecute criminals and her race-driven activism to pander to her ethnic base.
The leading Democrat in the race to challenge Foxx, Conway vowed to enact real criminal justice reform and “keep our community safe” if elected as the States Attorney. Conway would run in the Democratic Primary in March 2020 to unseat Foxx and then run in the General Election in November 2020.
Conway said he will promote a criminal justice system that’s fair and humane to non-violent offenders, and will make us all safer by keeping the most dangerous off our streets, cutting off the flow of illegal guns into our community, and getting politics out of an office where it doesn’t belong.
As a Cook County Assistant State’s Attorney, Bill went after corrupt government officials who betrayed the public’s trust. And drawing from lessons he learned as a Naval Intelligence Officer fighting the Taliban, Bill will use new and innovative strategies to cut off the flow of illegal guns into our neighborhoods.
Bill was born and raised in Chicago. After earning degrees from the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School and Georgetown School of Law, he returned home to become a Cook County Assistant State’s Attorney.
In the State’s Attorney’s Office, Bill worked every day to find justice for victims. He watched non-violent offenders have their lives ruined by a system that wrongly prioritized low-level crimes while dangerous criminals worked loopholes and went back on the streets. Bill put the truly dangerous behind bars, but focused on giving a second chance to people who just made a mistake, allowing them to pull their lives together and become productive members of our community.
Conway went on to join the office’s newly created Public Corruption and Financial Crimes unit, in which he fought to hold corrupt, politically-connected government officials accountable. He also put multiple police officers who abused their power in jail, because those who are supposed to enforce the law shouldn’t be above it.
Today, the State’s Attorney’s Office, where Bill once worked, needs change. Regardless of race, zip code, income level, or who they know, everyone deserves fairness, justice, and equality.
For years the approach in Afghanistan had been to target Taliban fighters, who would then be replaced by more militants with more weapons. Bill’s mission with Naval Intelligence was to employ new and innovative tactics to go after the drug money that financed the Taliban’s gun trafficking. He learned that if you follow the money, you can root out the cause of the problem.
Here at home, the old way of keeping illegal guns off our streets isn’t working. The police are getting the illegal guns, only to have perpetrators of gun violence back on the street with new and more deadly weapons. Bill wants to take the lessons he learned in the Navy to bring new, smart, and innovative strategies to cut off the funding that puts illegal guns on our streets. Working in our communities and with our neighboring counties and states, we can make us all safer by going after the gangs that profit by flooding our streets with illegal guns. And if you commit a crime with a gun while Conway’s in office, you’re going to jail.
In addition to his law degree, Bill also holds an MBA from the University of Chicago. Today he teaches finance at DePaul University and lives in Chicago with his wife Brittany. They are due with their first child in November 2019.
Use the hashtag #NewDayConway in commenting about Conway on Twitter and Social Media.
For more information on Conway, visit his website at www.newdayconway.com.
Hanania also writes about Middle East issues for the Arab News, and The Arab Daily News criticizing government policies in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
Hanania was named "Best Ethnic American Columnist" by the New America Media in November 2007, and is the 2009 recipient of the SPJ National Sigma Delta Chi Award for column writing.
Email Ray Hanania at rghanania@gmail.com.
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