Cook County Board of Review Commissioner Samantha Steele was arrested for driving while intoxicated last fall. The case is still pending, but Steele hopes to distance herself from the incident and potentially run for Cook County assessor.
In her first interview since the incident, Steele explained to NBC 5 Political Reporter Mary Ann Ahern what led up to the arrest on Nov. 10 near Ashland and Winnemac avenues in the city’s Ravenswood neighborhood.
“So, you were not drunk?” Ahern asked.
“I was not. No. Absolutely not,” Steele said.
“The police officer reported an open bottle of red wine,” Ahern asked.
“And the video footage that I saw shows him opening the bottle of red wine,” Steele responded. “I had gone to lunch. I had a glass of wine, and I wanted to keep the bottle. And so, I brought it with me. It’s not against the law.”
Steele still faces one charge after a second one was dropped. Body camera footage shows the Steele crashing into two parked cars. She refused police requests to show her license and told them her attorney was coming. Steele told NBC 5 her peripheral vision was impacted by a medical condition.
“I was diagnosed with a pituitary tumor and the medication interfered,” she said.
A police officer said during the arrest, Steele made a crude comment about his anatomy, but she denies it.
“I did not. The verbiage that he used — there is no evidence. No evidence of that. The language that he used is not the language that I would have used,” she said.
Steele serves on the three-member panel that hears property tax appeals in Cook County but has her sights set on a different office: Cook County office.
Steele, incumbent Fritz Kaegi and three others who are eyeing the assessor job — Patrick Hynes, Dana Pointer and Timnetra Burruss — appeared before Cook County Democratic committee people Wednesday to ask for the party endorsement. Hynes is the assessor for Lyons Township. Pointer and Burruss are on the Cook County Board of Review with Steele.
Steele said she will not run for assessor if she does not get the party leaders support, a decision that will be made in mid-July. She has worked in the field for 20 years, but questions remain about whether she will be able to move past the incident.
“I do wish that no one in this room has to face the public scrutiny that I have had to face,” Steele told the committee people.
Kaegi has already donated $500,000 to his own campaign. When asked how she’ll compete with that, Steele responded: “Do we really want another rich White man buying office?”
Kaegi responded to Steele’s criticisms, saying: “We don’t take donations from property tax appeals lawyers. I’m the first assessor to do that.”
Kaegi has served as the county assessor since 2018. He said it’s not a “glamorous” job, but he’s proud of the work his office has done.
“Wealthy people run for other offices. I’m blessed to try to do this, and it does give me independence from some of the special interests who have dominated our property tax system before, some of whom are sitting in jail,” Kaegi said.
Kaegi stands by his work and said his focus continues to be on homeowners. Steele, however, said Kaegi has pitted the business community against homeowners.
“Immediately, I would go into freezing assessments and start working on collecting the data,” Steele said.
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