Sun Times-Mosley Braun Blames Rahm Emanuel For Dems Big Loss

Former U.S. Senator from Ill. and Chicago Mayoral candidate Carol Moseley Braun: radfilms.com

(Story reported by Lynn Sweet for the Chicago Sun Times)

Chicago mayoral hopeful Carol Moseley Braun, the former senator and ambassador, slammed rival Rahm Emanuel's Hollywood fund-raiser on Thursday--but perhaps more telling, hit his tenure as chief of staff for President Obama. That Emanuel helped Obama in the White House is "fiction," Moseley Braun asserted.

Said Moseley Braun in a statement, "On this day when President Obama and Illinois Democrats are still recovering from the painful political debacle that he was the architect of, Rahm Emanuel is off in Hollywood hanging out with bankers and billionaires. But maybe Hollywood is where he belongs because the story of how he "helped" the Obama administration when he was chief of staff is indeed fiction.

"Rahm Emanuel cut and ran after pushing policies that lead to the biggest Democratic Party political loss in 27 years.

"He left the President holding the bag. If Rahm abandoned the President of the United States, what makes anybody think heʼll stick by regular Chicagoans?" Moseley Braun said.

Blaming Emanuel for Obama's political woes following Tuesday's Democratic thumping-- ups the ante.

Emanuel did not exactly cut and run. He said--starting last January--that he was only going to stay on for about two years. That Emanuel departed when he did was triggered by Mayor Richard Daley's surprise September announcement that he would not seek a seventh term next year and the need to pull together a campaign from scratch since nominating petition are due later this month.

Emanuel stepped down as chief of staff to run for mayor with a tremendous White House send-off--an East Room ceremony headlined by Obama.

(Click here to read the full story on the Chicago Sun Times website.)