Quinn, Rauner Spending Big On Early TV Ads

(CBS) --Illinois Governor Pat Quinn has joined challenger Bruce Rauner on TV, with an unusually early series of campaign commercials.

Ironically, the new Quinn ads started airing the same day a new poll commissioned and carried by GOP linked organizations shows Rauner with a double digit lead.

CBS 2 Chief Correspondent Jay Levine reports as predicted several months ago, this could go down as the most expensive Illinois race ever. With broadcast sources telling us both candidates are now spending more than $300,000 a week on TV and it's not even Labor Day, which traditionally is the start of the heavy spending home stretch.

According to the We Ask America poll, has a 14 point lead over Quinn.

"I've run a lot of elections, I ran four years (ago) for governor. There were some who said I was behind, I wasn't behind on Election Day and the guy I ran against, he is still looking for his gym shoes," Quinn said.

Gov Quinn was in Berwyn Tuesday morning, talking about a proposal to increase school funding. Rauner was on the South Side, and in the Loop, where he reacted to the latest Quinn campaign ad that calls Quinn a "leader."

"Unfortunately, Pat Quinn is not a leader and Illinois is really not coming back," Rauner said.

Rauner hass been on the attack non-stop for more than a year, raising money, traveling non-stop, running ad after ad even during summer months when most campaigns take a break.

"What is really hot and heavy is our work ethic and our message about lower taxes, more jobs and better schools and term limits on these career politicians, they love the message and that is why we are leading. We are going to win," Rauner said.

No one's taking polls too seriously right now, perhaps because We Ask America, which shows Rauner leading is the same pollster that showed Mayor Rahm Emanuel trailing Karen Lewis. A new mayoral poll out Tuesday by a pollster who worked for the Obama campaign, comes to the exact opposite conclusion; that the mayor is now leading Lewis.