OPINION: Bernard Schoenburg: Retired UAW national organizing director taking on LaHood in 18th

Oct. 24--MARK HAASIS, 66, a Springfield native now of Peoria and a retired national organizing director for the United Auto Workers, is circulating petitions to run as a Democrat for the U.S. House in the 18th Congressional District.

The incumbent in the district, U.S. Rep. DARIN LaHOOD, R-Peoria, first won the seat in a 2015 special election, and will be seeking his third full two-year term in the 2020 election.

"I don't think he should just have a clear path to another term," Haasis said of LaHood in a telephone interview. "I think the district can do better."

Haasis was in the 1971 class of the old Griffin High in Springfield, and got a political science degree in 1975 from the University of Illinois at Urbana. He moved to Peoria in 1978, when he got a job at a Caterpillar Inc. diesel engine plant in Mossville. He became a union steward there, but was among those laid off in the early 1980s. He worked for the city of Peoria for more than eight years, and then was an early hire, in 1989, at the then-new Mitsubishi plant in Normal.

He moved in 1998 to UAW staff, and his wife of 36 years, SANDRA, had also worked at Mitsubishi and moved in 2013 to UAW staff. They have two children and four grandchildren, and both retired last year.

While Haasis has not held elective office, he has been around the electoral process. For three of his years with the UAW, from 2007 to 2010, he was the coordinator of the union's political program in Illinois. That means he was involved in choosing which candidates to back for state and federal offices.

For the final eight years with the UAW, Haasis said he had a condo in Detroit to work out of union headquarters in that city, but kept his Peoria residence and always voted in Peoria.

Haasis knows the 18th is a strongly Republican area, where President DONALD TRUMP won in 2016 by more than 26 points, and that LaHood has funding -- more than $2 million on hand in a recent report -- that he likely will not be able to match.

But, he added, "It's hard to tell what the landscape will be by Nov. 3 of next year."

He said he thinks he can "outmatch" LaHood with dedicated people, and many are already helping his effort.

LaHood, Haasis said, has been "super supportive of President Trump," while being critical of some of Trump's language. LaHood has said he likes the results he sees from Trump's administration.

Haasis says he sees evidence contrary to the idea that "every positive thing is because of Trump," and also said LaHood's argument against the impeachment inquiry -- that Democrats just want to undo the results of the 2016 election -- is "a ridiculous argument."

LaHood tweeted on Oct. 9: "Since Day one of (Trump's) term, Democrats have been fixated on undoing the results of the 2016 election. And now, they are throwing due process out the window by rushing their impeachment process."

Haasis said he definitely backs the impeachment inquiry, and "the ultimate results of that should be based on the evidence." He said Trump "basically indicted himself" by telling reporters on the White House lawn that he wanted Ukraine to dig into American corruption, and Trump also asked China to look into former Vice President JOE BIDEN and his son.

Asked if those things are impeachable, Hassis said it's premature to say "until all the evidence comes out."

On health care, Haasis says the Affordable Care Act was "a step in the right direction," but there are "obviously some flaws" and "we need to build on it." He said he thinks Republicans, who have tried to repeal the law, are working to "attack it bit by bit" to make it less functional so people will just say, "This isn't working, forget it."

He said Congress needs to stand up to big drug companies, and as for moving to a single-payer system for health care over time, "there's a lot to be said for it."

"If it is going to be phased out, it should be done over a reasonable period of time," he said of private health insurance. "I'm not sure health care is something that meets the ideal model of the free enterprise system."

On abortion, he said he is "generally in favor of women to be able to control their own bodies." He respects people who are pro-life on the issue, he said. But he also questions how a pro-life officeholder like LaHood can strongly back Trump, who has talked of threatening mass destruction when speaking of potential military conflicts. One example came early in the Trump administration, when the president talked of how events might give him no choice but to "totally destroy" North Korea.

"It's basically genocide he's talking about," Haasis said. "There's some things that should just be out of bounds."

Haasis said he expects to make a formal announcement of his run in a matter of weeks.

"Congressman LaHood is proud of his record representing central and west-central Illinois," said Jim Reis, his campaign political director. "He has worked hard to earn the strong support of the voters and looks forward to continuing to build on that success in 2020."

Big deal?

Among recent controversies involving President Trump was his administration's initial announcement that the United States would host the G-7 conference of world leaders at the Trump resort in Doral, Florida.

Before Trump himself pulled the plug on the idea, The Washington Post had a story headlined: "Growing number of Republicans struggle to defend Trump on G-7 choice, Ukraine and Syria."

Among those quoted in the article was U.S. Rep. RODNEY DAVIS, R-Taylorville, on the G-7 question.

"I don't see what the big deal is, frankly," Davis told the newspaper.

Though critics said that if Doral were used, it would violate the emoluments clause of the Constitution, which bars presidents from getting gifts or payments from foreign governments, Trump said he disagreed. He tweeted that he thought it would have been "good for our country" to have Doral host the event, "But, as usual, the Hostile Media & their Democrat Partners went CRAZY!"

Contact Bernard Schoenburg: [email protected], 788-1540, twitter.com/bschoenburg.

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