Earlier this week, it was announced that Chance the Rapper would be meeting with Illinois governor Bruce Rauner to discuss “funding education.” Well, the private meeting went down today (March 3) at the Thompson Center and afterwards the rapper revealed his disappointment.
Speaking to reporters, a flustered Chance The Rapper discussed the chat, which was centered on Chicago Public Schools funding, and said it failed to go down as planned, noting that the governor had given “vague answers” during the 40 minutes meeting.
“I’m here ’cause I just want people to do their jobs,” the musician told reporters afterwards. “And I did speak with the governor. I asked him about funding CPS with that $215 million that was discussed in May of last year and was vetoed in December over, you know, political arguments and (stuff).”
The Chicago Sun-Times reports that Chance and Rauner spoke for a little over a half hour in Chicago to discuss the $215 million set aside for the Chicago public school system that collapsed in a curious budget deal. “He asked me where I thought the $215 million was supposed to come from,” Chance said. Later he added that his aim was to “take our kids off the table.”
“The kids are on the table right now. And, we spoke for a second, it sounded like it was going to—it sounded like we were going somewhere, but it sounds like it’s hinged on passing other bills. I’m not a politician. I’m here ’cause I’m a dad, I’m an after-school teacher.” Chance also called on “the international publications” to “give a comprehensive history of how we ended up here” in regards to the current issues surrounding Chicago public schools.
Rauner, meanwhile, felt differently.
“We had a discussion about education and education funding,” the Governor stated. “Good exchange of views on what the options are, what the possibilities are.”
“I think we agreed that we’re going to talk further in the coming days, and we talked about working together,” he added.
In the end, the outcome of what was positioned to be a positive meeting, turned out to be the opposite.
Following the meeting, Chance tweeted: “The fight has just begun.”