Mike Klonsky's SmallTalk Blog: Rauner tells POLITICO: 'I wasn't in Cuba. I was in, um...Europe.'

Mike Klonsky's SmallTalk Blog: Rauner tells POLITICO: 'I wasn't in Cuba. I was in, um...Europe.':

Rauner tells POLITICO: 'I wasn't in Cuba. I was in, um...Europe.'

“You’d be amazed at what we ate. I’m not going to tell you that.” -- Gov. Rauner

Natasha Korecki is one of my favorite reporters on the Chicago scene. I peruse her Illinois Playbook in POLITICO most mornings over breakfast. You should too.

It looks like she perused mine on Saturday when I raised the possibility that Gov. Rauner's secret vacation had taken him to Cuba to hang out with his pal, Rahm Emanuel.

Got that last piece from reliable sources who say they spotted the gov in Havana. Are reporters even curious? I mean, Rahm/Rauner wining and dining together in Cuba while the city sizzles and the state floods (literally).

To her credit, she took my charge seriously and undaunted by Rahm's previous hissy-fit over her colleague Mike Allen's broaching of the Cuba topic, Korecki put it right to the gov. Here's what she came away with.

 To the conspiracy theorists who believed Emanuel and Gov. Bruce Rauner were secretly puffing cigars and toasting Mojitos in Cuba on a joint, clandestine vacation -- not true. They were drinking Cuba Libres? No, no, no. While the two have been known to enjoy a pricey bottle of wine and fish together in their free time, the governor was in fact in Europe with his family on vacation over winter break. He paid Mike Klonsky's SmallTalk Blog: Rauner tells POLITICO: 'I wasn't in Cuba. I was in, um...Europe.':