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Ives campaign removes controversial retweet

The Twitter account for Republican gubernatorial candidate Jeanne Ives retweeted - then took down its retweet - of a message posted by a man whose page contains white supremacist and anti-Semitic content.

The man, whose account says he's from Palatine, tweeted Saturday in support of the Wheaton lawmaker's recent controversial television ad and said he donated $1,000 to her campaign to unseat Gov. Bruce Rauner.

A staff member for Ives' campaign retweeted the message "without realizing who this individual was," spokeswoman Kathleen Murphy said in a statement, which was also posted on Twitter. The retweet was deleted from Ives' account Sunday.

"We repudiate him," Murphy said. "We disavow any endorsement and are returning any contribution."

The post was retweeted just days after Ives canceled a fundraising speech by Bill Whittle, a conservative political commentator who previously commented that African-Americans are intellectually inferior to whites. Ives' campaign said in a statement that it was unaware of Whittle's remarks, which are "obviously offensive and objectionable," and disinvited him from the event.

Ives has also been under fire after her statewide ad targeting the transgender community, undocumented immigrants and women who get abortions began airing this weekend. Critics have denounced the ad as racist and homophobic, though several lawmakers said they stand by their endorsements of Ives.

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