Jerry, just remember, it’s not a lie if you believe it. – George Costanza
I’d really like to write about something or someone other than Elgin city councilman and mayoral hopeful Corey Dixon, but he had the temerity to call my abundantly questionable character into question. All self-deprecating humor aside, if you’re going to aim for a columnist’s reputation, you better make it a clean shot because winging them only makes them angry.
To wit, instead of resorting to the silence I so highly recommended, Dixon issued a mendacious Tuesday morning social media manifesto that only served to make his lagging campaign finance reporting matters that much worse. When you consider how bad they were to begin with, that kind of political ditch digging takes some serious skills.
In fact, Dixon’s declaration is so rife with fabrications that I’m beginning to believe our candidate is your garden variety pathological liar.
He reiterated that he “didn’t use campaign funds” to pay the $3,500 in Illinois State Board of Elections late reporting fees, but that’s exactly what he did. Because whenever you lend your committee the cash to pay those fines, it makes them campaign funds. It would’ve been far more accurate to say he didn’t use other people’s money to settle that debt, but the jury’s still out on that one, too.
Should Dixon have any campaign funds left after the April election, he would be well within his rights to pay that loan back to himself when he thinks no one’s looking. I certainly wouldn’t put it past him.
Dixon also insisted that “much of what is being said is false,” about this lingering story, which ironically, is false. Both The First Ward and the Courier-New presented irrefutable ISBE evidence of how his disregard for the process added up to $6,800 in fines over the course of four years.
But the overarching theme of Dixon’s pathetic public pronouncement was, “You know me to be transparent with my past, present and future,” which is just another lie.
The bulk of the basis for his self-declared “it was a miscommunication” fine excuse is he never told the ISBE he moved in 2020, and their warnings went to his old address. But ILCS 5/9-3a clearly states that anyone with an active political committee must notify the ISBE of an address change “within 10 days” of the move.
But Dixon didn’t amend his D1 committee organization filing until November 28, 2022, three long years after the fact. I don’t know about you, but “transparency” isn’t exactly the word I’d apply here.
Then our intrepid candidate disingenuously wrote:
The truth of the matter is, that once the issue was caught I took action, swiftly changed processes that were in place and changed my campaign financing staff – appointing a new Campaign Treasurer Chair.
If by “swiftly taking action” he means moving mildly faster than the time it took him to file a change of address notification, then I’m on board. And please remember that, by the time the ISBE threatened to throw him off the ballot in January, Dixon had already paid off $1,200 in penalties. The he immediately proceeded to rack up another $5,800 in fines.
Even after that ISBE threat forced him to pay up, Dixon persisted in his tardiness. He was 23 days late filing his A1 report required after loaning his campaign more than $500, which means he’ll be hit with another $500 fine. And the part about entirely revamping his political committee? Per the previously cited statute, those personnel changes also require a ten-day amended D1 filing, which Dixon has, so far, failed to submit – 45 days later.
That impending ISBE fine and the missing D1 make Dixon’s assertion that “Late filings will never occur again” yet another bold-faced lie.
Dixon closed out his truth, justice, and the American way Facebook commentary by noting that, “If you want to have coffee/tea, it’ll be on me,” directing voters to a link to do just that. I’d encourage guests to ask our self-proclaimed scion of transparency about how the city manager had to ask him to pay back a number of questionable charges on his city issued credit card.
I’m sure he’d be more than happy to tell you all about it.
When my source sent me all of that ISBE fine documentation, I thought this would be nothing more than a story on my longstanding theory that, if you can’t get the paperwork right, what does that say about your capacity to govern? But after Dixon’s absurd responses to that story, it’s become so much more than that.
Dixon’s not nearly the only politician who resorts to untruths whenever it suits him, but what sets him apart is how he lies with the ease most of us take our next breath. And we’ve all just endured a leader who held no regard for the truth, and it wasn’t very pretty, was it?
Please don’t subject the city of Elgin to that same sad phenomenon.
Lastly, if Mr. Dixon truly believes I’m the one who has trouble with the truth, I’d encourage him to send me an official “invitation” to a Kane County courtroom where I’d be more than happy to proceed with the case pro se. After all, the truth is the ultimate defense against libel.
