Jeanne Ives trying to raise money for 19-year-old challenging Madigan lieutenant

State Rep. Jeanne Ives (R-Wheaton) came within an eyelash of upsetting now-outgoing Gov. Bruce Rauner in the Republican gubernatorial primary, leaving Rauner so wounded, he explored options to replace himself as the GOP nominee.

Now, Ives is diving head-first into ward politics on the Southwest Side of Chicago — by asking the 43,000 people on her statewide email list to contribute $10 apiece to the 19-year DePaul University student challenging Ald. Marty Quinn (13th).

Ives said she’s going to bat for David Krupa in his battle against incumbent Quinn, a top lieutenant in the political army of Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan (D-Chicago) because she cares deeply about the “rule of law.”

She accused Quinn of breaking that rule of law in his now-dropped petition challenge against Krupa.

“It looks to me like it’s blatant election law violations. Filing false affidavits — 2,600 of them, by the way. Talk about a kid who’s being bullied and laws being broken to benefit Madigan’s top lieutenant. I find it appalling,” Ives said Tuesday.

“I think everybody ought to send him ten bucks and help him out here. … My point is, that’s enough to prosecute the 2,600 people who should be prosecuted for filing a false affidavit against a 19-year-old. … I’m trying to help him prosecute the violators. He’s got legal fees and stuff. And if he won the race, that would be great as well.”

Quinn said he’s not at all surprised that Ives would weigh in on Krupa’s behalf.

“Far-right Republicans, the Illinois Policy Institute, Jeanne Ives, have been after me for a long time. … This is just a continuation of that.”

Asked about Ives’ claims about election fraud and 2,600 “false affidavits,” Quinn tried to shift the spotlight to Krupa.

“In order to get 1,700 signatures in the 13th Ward, someone had to be disingenuous. A hard-right Republican. A self-proclaimed Trump Republican,” Quinn said.

“How does someone get 1,700 signatures as a self-proclaimed Trump supporter without being disingenuous? That’s the question that runs through my mind. Where J.B. Pritzker is getting 74 percent of the vote. There are some precincts in the 13th Ward where J.B. Pritzker got 90 percent of the vote.”

Krupa could not be reached for comment.

On Saturday, Quinn withdrew his bid to strong-arm Krupa off the ballot after his petition objection drew accusations of Chicago machine-style political fraud.

Before Krupa even filed his petitions, Quinn supporters had filed nearly 3,000 affidavits allegedly signed by people seeking to revoke their signatures for Krupa. That’s despite the fact that Krupa had collected only about 1,700 signatures.

Only 187 of the signature-revocation affidavits actually matched signatures on Krupa’s petition sheets, according to Krupa’s attorney. That means more than 2,600 were potentially fraudulent.

Quinn said he dropped the challenge because he has worked hard developing a good reputation with his constituents.

“I didn’t want some sort of challenge to tarnish my reputation,” the alderman said.

“I’ve worked very hard in servicing the constituents. I’ve worked very hard in being responsive to them. And we’ll have an election and let the voters decide. I’m OK with that.”

Earlier this year, Quinn found himself at the center of a #MeToo scandal swirling around Madigan’s once-impenetrable political organization.

The alderman was accused of playing a pivotal go-between role between his own brother and political consultant Alaina Hampton, who has accused Kevin Quinn of stalking her with a series of harassing text messages.

Madigan fired Kevin Quinn and banned a second lieutenant, Shaw Decremer, from his political organization because of allegations of bullying and harassment.

That didn’t stop political consultant Hampton from filing a federal lawsuit accusing Quinn and Madigan of not doing enough to stop Quinn’s brother from harassing her.

Hampton claims she told Ald. Quinn, her political mentor, a year ago about Kevin Quinn’s behavior. But Hampton has accused Ald. Quinn of choosing to “protect Kevin instead of me,” giving her no choice but to leave Madigan’s political organization.

Ald. Quinn has maintained that, as soon as Hampton told him about the text messages, he immediately directed his brother to “stop all communication” with her and warned Kevin Quinn that, if he didn’t, he would be fired immediately.

The alderman said he took no further action — nor did he tell Madigan — because “I was attempting to protect Ms. Hampton’s privacy and honor her wishes” that the allegations be kept quiet and that Kevin Quinn “not be further reprimanded.”