South Central Reporter

Attorney General candidate Tom DeVore, a Greenville-based attorney, said he decided to take on the challenge after he successfully overturned masking in schools. 

“The judicial race was something that I thought fit my lifestyle and what I was looking to do until February 4th," DeVore told South Central Reporter. "[A] judge issued that order. And since that time, I've been getting thousands and thousands. I saw the messages and emails and videos. I saw the parents of the state and I saw little children of this state standing up for themselves, trying to say, ‘Look, I have rights and I want them to be respected, etc.’”

"And once I saw them doing that, I was just compelled to say I can't leave them and go sit on the bench and not be able to advocate for them anymore to make sure that this kind of stuff never happens again," he added. "So and when I say this kind of stuff never happens again, I think it's important for people to understand it doesn't mean anti-mask, anti-mitigation type of stuff. That just means that if we're going to do these things if they're done properly through the legislature and not the executive trying to force them on everybody with intimidation tactics."

DeVore said his commitment to helping goes beyond politics.

"And to the extent [that] I don't want that to happen again and see the children and the parents and businesses go through this, I felt the only way I could even do that was through the Attorney General's Office," he explained. "And so I made the decision that even though I'm not much for politics and I'm not going to play any political games that they like to do, I'm just going to say this is what I'll do if you want to elect me and here I am.”

DeVore's case essentially overturned masking in schools, when Sangamon County Judge Raylene Grischow declared Pritzker's universal state emergency school, which took the shape of masks and test mandates through the Illinois Department of Public Health, "null and void" on a Feb. 4 order, the Center Square reported. The Fourth District Appellate Court upheld the decision to deny the mask mandate. She claimed that without their authorization, the governor and his agencies enforced rules on students. 

DeVore has long been a critic of Gov. J.B. Pritzker's Covid guidelines, wrex.com reported. He filed a lawsuit on behalf of restaurants impacted by Pritzker's policies in 2020. 

Pritzker has had it with DeVore in public. Pritzker referred to DeVore as a "grifter" after filing the school disguising lawsuit, the local Patch site reported. To promote his campaign, DeVore has started using the hashtag #GrifterWins.