In the Illinois 2nd District Special Election to replace Jesse Jackson, Jr., New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s Independence USA PAC has gone all in, spending an estimated $1.4 million in attack ads against former Congresswoman Debbie Halvorson and endorsing anti-gun-extremist Robin Kelly.

Kelly has proudly campaigned against guns throughout the campaign. At a forum held in suburban Dolton, IL, earlier in the campaign, Kelly told voters, “I’m all for banning guns, and I will be a leader in that.” Kelly has also boasted proudly of her “F” grade from the NRA. At a candidate forum at the Trinity Unity Church of Christ, Kelly claimed as she has several times on the campaign trail, “I got an F from the NRA, something I’m proud of, I don’t have to go back and study and take the test anymore, I’m proud of my F.”

And despite a court ruling that the Illinois ban against conceal and carry, is unconstitutional, Kelly said, “I am proud that we are the state that doesn’t have it.” 

Kelly also went against her Democrat counterparts who argued that jobs is the most important issue facing the district at a recent forum held at Governor’s State University, claiming that stopping violence was a more important issue.

Kelly previously served as chief of staff to former Illinois State Treasurer Alexi Giannoulias, who lost his bid for U.S. Senate against Mark Kirk after his family’s Broadway Bank was seized by the FDIC after making over $75 million in bad bank loans. The Chicago Tribune reported on Tuesday that Kelly was the subject of an ethics investigation during for her time at the Treasurer’s office while she was campaigning for the Treasurer’s job herself.

From the Trib:

After Robin Kelly lost a 2010 bid for state treasurer, the office’s chief investigator alleged she violated ethics laws by improperly reporting time off from her taxpayer-funded job as chief of staff to then-Treasurer Alexi Giannoulias.

The treasurer’s personnel rules required all of a worker’s time off to be approved ahead of time by a supervisor. But from August 2009 through December 2010 — when Kelly was campaigning for treasurer — Kelly filed 107 requests for unpaid time off, the audit found. Of those requests, 82 percent were not approved by a supervisor, but by a human resources director who reported to Kelly, the audit found. Many of those requests were submitted well after the time off had already been taken, the audit found.

In addition, the audit stated that 19 of Kelly’s 24 monthly time-off calendars in 2009-10 were OK’d before her time-off requests had received final approval. It also found 17 of those 24 calendars were approved late and three were never approved.

It appeared Kelly “could come and go as she pleased without consequence,” Ringler wrote. “It also appears that (her time-off) calendars were made to match the times that they needed to, in order to end up with a 35-hour work week and/or 7-hour day, because of the number of times they were approved, reversed, reapproved, reversed again, approved a third time, etc.”The Tribune also reports “Executive Inspector General David Wells recommended that Kelly be disciplined, according to a letter from Giannoulias.”

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Photo: Robin Kelly for Congress/Facebook