By DOUG E. IBENDAHL • June 19, 2018
I’ve written a couple of articles about Sean Morrison in the past few months. To review, Morrison is basically the Cook County, Illinois version of the Boss Hogg character from the old The Dukes of Hazzard television series.
Only more buffoonish.
Sean Morrison has locked-up for himself pretty much every political title available in his corner of Cook County. He’s the Republican Township Committeeman for Palos Township, and since 2016, he’s also been the Chairman of the Cook County Republican Party.
And as Palos Township Republican Committeeman he was able to vote for himself and also snag one of just 18 seats on the Illinois Republican Party’s senior governing board (he’s a state central committeeman).
But Morrison in truth does little for Republicans. He has another title, and it’s the big one he really cares about. He’s also a public official, one of just 17 Commissioners on the Cook County Board. Morrison’s main focus is avoiding anything “too Republican” in his quest to keep that cushy public office in heavily Democratic Cook County.
Morrison is so lackadaisical towards anything not about him, he failed to lift a finger to find a legitimate Republican candidate to run for congress in his own congressional district. It’s the 3rd U.S. congressional district in which he resides where that crazy Nazi got a free pass in the GOP Primary in March. The crazy Nazi will appear on the Republican ballot line on the November ballot, when at such time he’ll presumably (hopefully) be steamrolled by the incumbent Democrat, Dan Lipinski.
We have to rely on the Democrats to finally put an end to a GOP disaster, thanks to Morrison’s selfishness and incompetence.
As bad as the Nazi thing is, I probably could have overlooked one enormous embarrassing screw-up. If we started kicking out party officials around here simply for being lazy, selfish and incompetent, we could start holding Illinois GOP meetings in a phone booth, if one could still be found.
But what I can’t overlook, and what no decent Republican should forgive, is the way Sean Morrison continues to disrespect black Trump supporters.
And it’s not just the fact Morrison still refuses to recognize black Chicago GOP ward committeemen who were duly elected over two years ago in a real election by Republican voters in the 2016 GOP Primary (Morrison’s Cook County GOP website still lists their positions as “vacant”). The last straw was when I personally witnessed Morrison denying black Trump supporters entry to the Cook County GOP Convention in April. I personally witnessed Morrison telling black Trump supporters they had to leave the event, or be arrested.
This level of stupidity and corruption is beyond belief, even by Illinois standards. Sean Morrison does not deserve any Republican title. His own public conduct makes that crystal clear. For that reason, I’ve called on top Illinois Republican Party officials, including Illinois Republican National Committeeman Richard Porter, multiple times, to join me in demanding Morrison’s resignation from every office the clown has denigrated. But Porter and the others still refuse to lift a finger to stop the abuse and disrespect of black candidates and black voters.
Unfortunately, it gets even worse. On Monday the Chicago Sun-Times broke a bombshell story detailing how Sean Morrison went to bat for one of his employees, even after Morrison knew that his then-46-year-old employee had preyed on a 14-year-old girl (a daughter of another employee’s girlfriend) at a barbeque/pool party Morrison hosted at his home in 2013.
In addition to his political and public jobs, Morrison also owns the private security firm, Morrison Security. (I strongly suspect the goon Morrison had at the door of the Cook County Republican Convention in April to help him bar unwanted Republicans, myself included, was an employee of that firm, but I can’t say for certain.) The now convicted child predator at issue was Anthony Martin, and at the time of the now proven criminal acts he was a senior vice president of Morrison’s security firm.
You have to read the entire Sun-Times article yourself for all of the disgusting details, but according to reports by the Orland Park Police, while at Morrison’s home, Martin “obtained the girl’s cell phone number at the party — and pinched her buttocks three times — after chatting with her about body piercings.” Then later that night Martin attempted to set up a meeting with the 14-year old girl.
Martin’s plot was thwarted when the girl showed the text messages to her mother who then went to police. Martin was charged in August 2013 with solicitation to meet a child.
Morrison learns about all of this, but still doesn’t fire Martin. Today Morrison gives a completely lame excuse for his inaction in 2013, blaming his lawyers and claiming he feared a “wrongful termination lawsuit” if he fired Martin. That’s just a total crock, in my own legal opinion.
Not only does Morrison not fire Martin immediately after learning Martin preyed on a young girl at Morrison’s own home, Morrison, through a lawyer, months later asks the judge in the Illinois criminal case to allow Martin to travel to Colorado for business (Martin at the time was presumably out of jail on bond, pending trial, and would have needed the court’s permission to travel out of state.)
In his October 2014 letter to the Cook County judge, Morrison stated that Martin was “instrumental in running my business.”
The judge did grant the request for Martin to travel to Colorado on Morrison Security business. And shortly after getting there, Martin gets arrested again, and for nearly the identical criminal conduct as in the pending Illinois case.
Fortunately, this time no actual child was involved, Martin was instead snared in a sting operation being run by the local district attorney’s office. But Martin thought he was setting up a meeting with another 14-year old girl.
This time Martin was charged with using the Internet for solicitation of an underage girl for sex.
At this point, Morrison did fire Martin. Apparently, his employee getting caught in a law enforcement sting was a bridge too far even for Morrison, even though soliciting an underage girl who was targeted at Morrison’s own party, using a Morrison firm-owned cell phone, wasn’t.
According to the Sun-Times, “Martin pleaded guilty in Colorado and was given a six-year suspended sentence, then transferred back to Illinois, where he pleaded guilty again in the Orland Park case and was sentenced to three years in prison.”
Morrison is spinning in circles now trying to justify why he not only didn’t immediately fire a child predator, but actually went out of his way to help the predator travel to another state where his employee tried to prey on children again.
The good news is Sean Morrison has absolutely no connection to Donald Trump. Morrison didn’t lift a finger for Trump in the campaign and has done nothing for the now President. Not only has Morrison done nothing for Trump, he’s actually gone out of his way to undermine the President’s serious minority outreach efforts.
Unfortunately for Governor Bruce Rauner, he can’t make the claim of no association. Sean Morrison, with his multiple titles, is a guy Rauner is counting on to deliver votes in Cook County, the home of the most voters, and even the most Republicans by far, of any Illinois county.
I wish the Governor good luck with that.
Doug Ibendahl is a Chicago Attorney and a former General Counsel of the Illinois Republican Party.
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