Willie Delgado
Template:TOCnestleft William (Willie) Delgado is a fulltime Illinois State Senator, representing the 2nd District. He was appointed to the position by Miguel Del Valle. Delgado previously served as a state representative. In the Illinois House Delgado was chair of the House Human services committee.
Delgado served 1999-2006 in the Illinois House, and 2006-Present in the Senate.[1]
Background
Senator Delgado was born in Newark, New Jersey. He received a B.A. in Criminal Justice from Northeastern University.[1]
DSA endorsement
Chicago Democratic Socialists of America endorsementsin the March 19th 1995 Primary Election went to Danny Davis, Patricia Martin, Willie Delgado and Barack Obama.
DSA's profile of Willie Delgado featured his work with West Town YMCA, Association House and his recent role as Director of Community Services for State Senator Miguel Del Valle[2].
- William Delgado is a candidate to win the Democratic ballot line for the Illinois House of Representatives in the 3rd District out on the west side of Chicago. He's a long time community activist with an academic background in criminal justice and social work. As such, he has been a youth program coordinator at the West Town YMCA and with Association House. Most recently, he was Director of Community Services for State Senator Miguel del Valle.
- Mr. Delgado is a real firebrand, but he's running a campaign that includes middle class issues concerning reinforcing sentencing laws and property tax relief. But he's also in favor of community policing, vigorous in his defense Medicaid and Medicare, and, most importantly for his constituency, an advocate for full state funding for schools.
New Party
In 1995 the radical Chicago New Party signed up Alice Palmer and Willie Delgado, a supporter of Illinois State Senator Miguel Del Valle.
According to Committees of Correspondence leader and New Party activist Carl Davidson[3];
- In the next two elections in the city -... the New Party has taken a slightly different approach. It organized a citywide candidates forum and invited a number of progressive candidates. Of those responding, two were of special interest, Alice Palmer and Willie Delgado. Alice Palmer is an Illinois state senator and Willie Delgado is an activist with an anti-Machine coalition of Latinos led by State Senator Miguel Del Valle.
- Both of these campaigns have strong local organizations that run as Democrats but are consistently opposed by the regular Democrats. Both are rooted in working-class communities with a large percentage of labor and left activists in their organizational structures. Alice Palmer especially has a long history with the African American left. Lou Pardo, a labor leader and New Party activist, is a strategist and organizer for Delgado.
- Both Palmer and Delgado attended the forum and were thoroughly questioned by 70 or so New Party members. At the close, both publicly signed a "contract" with the New Party... Two weeks later, the New Party formally endorsed them and is now mobilizing support.
In 1996 he ran for State Representative for the 35th ward in Chicago and almost won. He was a New Party member in late 1997,[4] and also at recorded as being a member at March 18, 1998.[5]
Freeing Juan E. Lopez
Pardoned Puerto Rican terrorist Jose E. Lopez with Congressman Luis Gutierrez and State Rep. Willie Delgado, Chicago 2000.[6]
Supported Progressive Health Care Reform
In late 2009, Willie Delgado was one of more than 1,000 state legislators to sign a letter entitled "State Legislators for Progressive Health Care Reform". The letter was a project of the Progressive States Network and was developed in consultation with national health care reform advocates, including the AFL-CIO, AFSCME, Community Catalyst, Families USA, Herndon Alliance, National Women's Law Center, Northeast Action, SEIU, and Universal Health Care Action Network. The letter reads in part,[7]
- "Failure to pass national comprehensive health reform now will further jeopardize state and local budgets, undermining public services like education, public safety, and transportation infrastructure... We, the undersigned, call on President Obama and the Congress to enact bold and comprehensive health care reform this year – based on these principles and a strong federal-state collaboration – and pledge our support as state legislators and allies in pursuit of guaranteed, high quality, affordable health care for all."
Anti death penalty
In 2009, Representative Karen Yarbrough (D-7) sponsored House Bill 262 to abolish the death penalty in Illinois. In 2010, Senator Willie Delgado (D-2) did the same in the Illinois Senate (SB 3569).[8]
2010 ICADP AGM
The Illinois Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty's Annual Meeting took place on Tuesday, July 13th, 2010, at 6 pm at the Illinois State Bar Association Offices, 20 S. Clark St., Suite 900, Chicago.
ICADP honored author and attorney Scott Turow for his "outstanding work toward abolition". ICADP also be honored the "Illinois State legislators who are currently co-sponsoring our abolition bills, including Rep. Karen Yarbrough, Rep. Angelo Saviano, Sen. William Delgado, Rep. Barbara Flynn Currie, Rep. Sara Feigenholtz, and Sen. Pamela J. Althoff. Chicago Democratic Socialists of America is an organizational member of the ICADP."[9]
Staff
The following have worked as staff members for Willie Delgado:[10]
References
- ↑ Jump up to: 1.0 1.1 Illinois Senate bio (accessed on August 4, 2011)
- ↑ New Ground 45 March - April, 1996
- ↑ http://web.archive.org/web/20010528042749/http://www.cofc.org/Publications/d12.htm#Independent%20electoral%20politics%20today:
- ↑ New Ground 56 January - February, 1998
- ↑ New Party Online News: Building The People's Machine in Chicago's 35th Ward, by Jonathan Green, March 18, 1998 (accessed on Sept. 14, 2011)
- ↑ [Fightback winter 2000 page2]
- ↑ Progressive States Network: State Legislators for Progressive Health Care Reform (accessed on Dec. 23, 2010)
- ↑ New ground No 129, March/April 2010
- ↑ New ground, May/June 2010
- ↑ Illinois Government website: Telephone Directory (accessed on Aug. 24, 2011)