Mark Hosty isn’t the only Forest Park village official with a tie to the presidential race. Village Administrator Michael Sturino has several connections to the cast of politicians eying roles in the White House.
Sturino-University of Delaware Class of 1988-was at the Newark campus at about the same time that Obama campaign manager David Plouffe was.
“I think he was in one of my political science classes,” Sturino, who is 42, said last week of Plouffe, who is a year younger than Sturino. “We just crossed paths. He clearly chose a much more political career … I’m more interested in policy and government.”
McCain campaign manager Steve Schmidt also went to the University of Delaware, home of the Blue Hens. But Sturino doesn’t remember crossing paths on the Newark campus with Schmidt, who is 37 and four years younger than Sturino.
A college student active Democratic politics in Delaware, Sturino worked as an intern for then U.S. Rep. Tom Carper (D-Delaware) and met Sen. Joe Biden several times during his internship. The Democratic vice presidential candidate senator is also a University of Delaware grad.
In his time in Illinois, Sturino has met both Barack Obama and John McCain.
He met Obama as early as the mid-1990s, when the current Democratic presidential candidate was the little-known new senator from Illinois.
“My wife is active in progressive causes,” Sturino said of his wife, Leslie.
In 2003, Sturino, who is a lawyer, won the Legal Eagle award from the Independent Voters of Illinois for work he did on a case about voters’ rights. Barack Obama, a previous Legal Eagle winner, was at the dinner where Sturino got his award.
By chance, Sturino met McCain at Shedd Aquarium during the same fundraiser for Jim Durkin where Mark Hosty met McCain. Though, he says, “I didn’t know who Mark Hosty was at the time.”
Sturino was glad to meet McCain.
“I always admired his maverick style and straight talk,” says Sturino, who wouldn’t name whom he’s supporting for president.
There is one player in this race Sturino hasn’t crossed paths with. “I’ve met three of the four. And I wouldn’t mind meeting the fourth,” he told the Review.
