MOLINE - Rich Morthland says he got the call a week ago.
"I was first astonished," said Morthland.
State Rep. Jeanie Ives is considering a run for Illinois Governor and has asked Morthland to be her running mate. The pair would challenge Governor Bruce Rauner in the Republican primary.
"What we`re doing under normal circumstances would be wrong. It`s not good to primary your own seated governor but his actions have brought this on himself, he`s done this. We`re not abandoning him, he has abandoned us," said Morthland.
Morthland was a Republican member of the Illinois General Assembly for a single term, from 2010-2012. Currently, Morthland sits on the Rock Island County Board and teaches at Black Hawk College but he says it's his agricultural experience that makes him a good candidate.
"I`m a farm guy and I`ve always been a farm guy and agriculture is still the single most important industry in the state of Illinois and it makes everything that we do in the Quad Cities keep going," said Morthland.
While neither have deep pockets, Morthland says that's not going to stop them from trying to get their names on the ballot.
"We can`t let the fact that somebody is filthy rich and frankly quite out of touch with the regular citizens of this state be the person who holds office we can`t let money be the answer and we won`t," said Morthland.
Candidates need at least 5,000 signatures by December 4th to run.
