Two political campaign firms with close ties to men with public corruption convictions have gotten business in recent years in Chicago and statewide political races, including the current, hotly contested race for Chicago School Board president and more than $1.5 million from Gov. JB Pritzker in his gubernatorial campaigns, records show.
In the governor’s campaigns, about $1.2 million went to a firm formed by a former Illinois Department of Children and Family Services deputy director, Bamani Obadele, who pleaded guilty in 2010 to a state contracting scheme under former Gov. Rod Blagojevich. Obadele was sentenced to six months in jail and ordered to repay more than $80,000.
Pritzker’s gubernatorial campaigns also spent more than $420,000 with the firm tied to Isaac “Ike” Carothers, a former Chicago City Council member who pleaded guilty in 2010 to taking $40,000 in home improvements from a developer who wanted to build homes in an industrial area in Carothers’ 29th Ward on the West Side.
In the school board race, the Chicago Teachers Union has spent more than $36,000 with the two firms and a company tied to a campaign worker, Karina Escobar-Perez, who pleaded guilty last year to forging signatures on campaign petitions in Indiana for the presidential race. The CTU work was for the campaign of Hilario Dominguez, whom the teachers union endorsed in June for school board president in a five-way race.
Dominguez’ campaign has reported $99,500 in contributions as of its latest filings, on Aug. 5. All of that was in-kind contributions from the CTU, and about one-third was to firms linked to Obadele, Carothers and Escobar-Perez.
The CTU’s political organization has used Carothers’ and Obadele’s firms in other school board races, and all three companies have done extensive work in other political races.
The Dominguez campaign did not respond to questions about the firms.
The governor’s campaign did not answer questions about Obadele’s and Carothers’ work but said: “The campaign hires consultants who are experienced and well-known organizers in their communities.”
A CTU spokeswoman said the people and groups they contracted with as “vendors are the same as those hired by Gov. Pritzker, Rep. [Margaret] Croke, and numerous other candidates.” In her statement, she didn’t explain those choices, focusing instead on their endorsed candidates: “What voters should know about the candidates we are supporting is that they will be the fiercest advocates for Chicago’s children instead of administrators of unnecessary cuts to their education.”
Pritzker is seeking reelection this year, again running against Republican Darren Bailey, whom he defeated by more than 12 percentage points in 2022. In 2018, Pritzker defeated incumbent Gov. Bruce Rauner by more than 15 percentage points.
Pritzker, who was among contenders to be Kamala Harris’ 2024 vice presidential running mate, has been attending political events across the country amid speculation he might run for president in 2028.
Obadele is president and director of Goshen Impact Solutions, according to state records. He admitted in federal court that in 2004 and 2005, when he was at DCFS, he steered contractors working for the state agency to buy promotional items from a company he owned and overcharged them, using proceeds for personal expenses, including an all-expenses-paid vacation for himself and friends to Jamaica. Separately, he admitted having generated business for a company whose board he sat on by telling DCFS contractors to hire the firm.
Records show Pritzker’s campaign paid Obadele’s firm more than $1 million during the 2022 election, though that spending appears to have escaped notice during the last election. So far, in the governor’s race, the campaign has spent $76,000 with the company, state records show.
Since 2015, just under half of all the state and local campaign cash that went to Obadele’s firm came from Pritzker’s campaign organization. Pritzker started using Obadele’s firm in 2022.
The CTU spent more than $16,000 with Obadele’s firm for work on behalf of Dominguez’ campaign. The union also gave his firm $5,250 for work related to Katherine Dunneback’s campaign in school board District 9b. The union endorsed Dunneback and a slate of other school board candidates in July.
In 2018, Illinois Attorney General Kwame Raoul came under scrutiny for spending $13,000 with Obadele for campaign work.
Obadele said his work on campaigns includes a variety of get-out-the-vote efforts across the South Side and elsewhere in Cook County. “I have done this the past 15 years with fidelity,” he wrote in response to questions.
In a written statement in response to questions, Obadele defended the work he’s done: “I’m neither ashamed nor proud of my past conviction. I paid my debt to society and have remained committed to pushing forward in a positive and impactful way. Since then, I have built and operated a successful professional business … This work has provided hundreds of individuals, including those who face barriers to employment. I stand for and believe in second chances and the importance of allowing people who have also paid their debt to society to receive the same opportunities I too was given.”
Obadele is also the “community and civic engagement director” for Acclivus Inc., a community health organization focused on violence prevention that has had dozens of state contracts in recent years worth more than $100 million, including $16 million in contracts for this fiscal year with the Illinois Department of Human Services and the Illinois Department of Commerce and Economic Opportunity.
Obadele said he doesn’t run Acclivus, and he’s proud to work there because of the anti-violence work it does in Chicago.
“My role there is to oversee community engagement and workforce development,” he wrote.
The governor’s office wouldn’t comment.
Sheila Regan, the chief operating officer for Acclivus, said, “It’s unclear what connection could be made between Obadele’s campaign work and Acclivus grants because there is no relationship between them.”
“All state grants to Acclivus have been awarded in alignment with state law, primarily via competitive grant processes,” she said.
Obadele’s campaign business has also worked for Mayor Brandon Johnson, Ald. Pat Dowell, state Rep. Kam Buckner, Croke and a Pritzker-backed group that campaigned unsuccessfully for a graduated income tax in 2020.
Another firm, Senior Wizdom Consulting (which is listed under various spellings in election records), is closely tied to Carothers and was paid more than $366,000 by Pritzker’s gubernatorial campaign in 2022 for “strategic field consulting” and has already made $55,000 for work done for the governor this year.
Carothers, who couldn’t be reached for comment, was indicted in 2009 over taking home improvements and sporting tickets from a developer who wanted to build homes at Galewood Yards, partly in Carothers’ ward. Carothers wore a wire to help the federal government in other investigations before being sentenced to 28 months in federal prison. He also admitted in his plea agreement that he took cash payments from two other individuals looking to develop property in his ward and another person who wanted to run carnivals there and needed city permits.
It appears Pritzker is Carothers’ largest client for state and local campaign work, accounting for nearly half of all of Carothers’ campaign work in state disclosures since 2015, although a precise figure is difficult to determine given the various spellings of the company’s name.
Senior Wizdom also received $11,600 from the CTU to help the Dominguez campaign.
As for CTU, records show the union paid Carothers’ firm at least $47,000 since 2023, including to work on Johnson’s mayoral campaign. It also paid Carothers’ firm $3,920 this summer to support Michilla Blaise, the CTU-endorsed candidate in the District 5b Chicago School Board race.
While dozens of Chicago City Council members have gone to prison, Carothers has the distinction of following in the footsteps of his father, former Ald. William Carothers, who also went to prison in a political corruption scandal.
Campaign records indicate Carothers has had dozens of other clients over that time as well, including former Cook County State’s Attorney Kim Foxx, state Senate President Don Harmon, D-Oak Park, and several Cook County judges.
A third consulting firm, Moving Forward Strategies, received $8,250 for work on Dominguez’ campaign. The union also reported $10,000 paid to the firm earlier this year. According to state records, the business is run by Escobar-Perez, a Chicago-area campaign operative.
In 2025, Escobar-Perez was charged with forging signatures on behalf of a 2024 presidential candidate named Dean Phillips in Indiana. She pleaded guilty to a felony for the forgeries and was sentenced to a year in prison and a year of probation. Escobar-Perez served one day in custody, and the prison sentence was suspended. Indiana court records show she owes more than $1,100 in fees and fines.
Escobar-Perez and two companies linked to her have taken in more than $400,000 for campaign-related work since 2020, most of which was from before she was charged. Since Escobar-Perez’ plea deal, the CTU has been one of Moving Forward Strategies’ largest clients.
Escobar-Perez did not return a written request for comment but told a police investigator she felt pressured to turn in the Indiana campaign petitions within a five-day deadline, according to a police report.