GOP leader tries to ‘sell hope’ in uphill battle to cut into Democratic stranglehold on state legislature

Republicans will try to chip away at the Democratic Party’s virtually unassailable control of the Illinois General Assembly in next month’s election, a task that may not be made any easier by the political polarization that starts at the top of the ballot.

In a decidedly blue state, former President Donald Trump’s candidacy could hurt the GOP in legislative swing districts, said John Shaw, director of the Paul Simon Public Policy Institute at Southern Illinois University at Carbondale.

“I think there is a guilt-by-association thing going on or a guilt-by-association possibility for Republicans who are running down ballot in swing districts, and even districts that maybe trend just a little bit Republican,” Shaw said.

Trump is “radioactive” not only to Democrats but also to many independents and some Republicans, Shaw said, which Democrats make clear they will try to use in their favor.

“You’re seeing folks leave the other party because of who’s at the top of their party,” Democratic House Speaker Emanuel “Chris” Welch said at a recent City Club of Chicago event, going on to say that GOP policy positions are out of step with many Americans.

“Their positions when it comes to workers’ rights, their positions when it comes to women’s rights, their positions when it comes to civil rights, that’s not a reflection of a whole lot of people’s values in this country,” Welch said. “And so they’re leaving that party and joining our party to make us even more diverse.”

House Republican Leader Tony McCombie of Savanna said her party is targeting just a few seats in each election as part of a 10-year plan that will carry them to the next redistricting opportunity following the 2030 census.

“The number one thing is that people expect us to fail,” McCombie said. “I have to sell hope a lot, which is not that hard, because I still am hopeful for Illinois, but it really is a challenge to raise money in this environment.”

The Democratic party’s financial advantage is huge.

Together, the state Democratic Party and the Illinois House Democrats’ campaign arm reported $5.56 million in their campaign coffers through September after spending $7.67 million in the past quarter, according to the State Board of Elections.

The state Republican Party and the House Republicans’ campaign group had $1.07 million on hand after spending $3.35 million in that quarter, records show.

All 118 state House seats and 24 of the 59 state Senate seats are up for election on Nov. 5. Democrats now hold veto-proof supermajorities in both chambers with 78 members in the House, the most in modern history, and 40 in the Senate.

Here’s a look at some potentially competitive races.

Elmhurst residents vie for open seat

In a race for a House seat left open when Democrat Jenn Ladisch Douglass chose not to seek reelection, Elmhurst City Councilman Martha “Marti” Deuter, a Democrat, faces Dennis Reboletti, an Elmhurst resident who served from 2007 to 2015 in the General Assembly and was once part of House Republican leadership.

The district is mostly within DuPage County with a sliver of Cook County as well. In 2022, Douglass defeated incumbent Republican Deanne Mazzochi, who had held the seat since 2018, by less than 1 percentage point. Douglass’ win was part of a wider political shift in suburbs that were once solidly Republican.

Deuter has been on the Elmhurst City Council for the past 11 years and has also worked for the city of Chicago’s Department of Housing, where she directed the city’s federal, state and local policy agendas. She now does work for a nonprofit that provides housing and support services for people transitioning out of homelessness.

“The high cost of living is a big issue for constituents in this district and throughout the state,” Deuter said. “Housing is one of the household’s biggest expenses, so there’s a lot of room to make improvement there.”

She has also made social issues a priority for her campaign, according to her website, championing LGBTQ+ rights and abortion rights. Her endorsements include one from Personal PAC, a leading political action committee in Illinois promoting abortion rights.

The state Democratic Party and the House Democrats’ campaign arm have invested greatly in the race. During the last quarter, Deuter received more than $390,000 in so-called in-kind contributions for ads, mailings and other functions from the two groups, state records show.

Reboletti has received more than $130,000 from the House Republicans’ campaign organization in the last few months and over $60,000 from the Illinois Republican Party in in-kind contributions, records show.

DuPage County election records show Deuter voted in the 2014 and 2016 Republican primaries. She said she couldn’t remember why she voted in the 2014 GOP primary, while noting DuPage historically has not had a lot of “active” Democratic primaries. In 2016, a presidential election year, Deuter said she couldn’t remember who she voted for for president in the GOP primary but that it wasn’t Trump. She said she voted for Democrat Hillary Clinton in that year’s general election.

Reboletti, supervisor of Addison Township, is trying to return to the General Assembly after two unsuccessful bids for a state Senate seat. He said the economy in Illinois is “lurching to the left and it needs some type of reasonable, moderate balance.”

“Sometimes, contrary to popular belief, you do need somebody who’s experienced in politics and in government and it’s my hope that I can hit the ground running on day one. I don’t need any time to dig into the issues,” Reboletti said in an interview.

Reboletti is one of four Republicans running for legislative seats to be endorsed by the Illinois Federation of Teachers, a union that more often backs Democrats. Reboletti acknowledged that is indicative of his position as having some pro-union, moderate stances.

Reboletti said his moderate positions extend to abortion. He said he backs allowing the procedure for women up to 26 weeks of their pregnancy, after previously saying it should be used only in cases of rape, incest or if the mother’s health was in jeopardy. However, he favors parental notifications of abortions, which were repealed a few years ago by Democrats in the General Assembly, and he’s against public funding for the procedure.

“We’re always learning. We’re always seeing things differently,” Reboletti said. “My position’s changed. It doesn’t only just change for the election. That’s just really how I am at this point. But it’s not the most important issue.”

In northwest suburbs, 2-term incumbent faces challenge

In a northwest suburban district that includes swaths of Lake and McHenry counties, Republican Rep. Martin McLaughlin’s bid for a third term is being challenged by Democrat Maria Peterson, who has worked as a labor attorney and once owned a fitness and exercise business.

In 2022, Peterson lost a state Senate bid to the chamber’s Republican leader at the time, Dan McConchie of Hawthorn Woods, by just 385 votes, or under a single percentage point.

McLaughlin has been critical of Democrats for approving $750 million in tax hikes as part of their $53.1 billion budget for the current fiscal year, and credits Republicans with raising alarm bells for the state’s mayors over Democratic Gov. JB Pritzker’s move to eliminate the state’s 1% sales tax on groceries, the revenue from which went directly to local governments.

“When you start talking about an individual family being impacted immediately because of a decision at the state level, now you’ve got engagement, understanding and hopefully action as it relates to who people are going to support moving forward,” McLaughlin, a former Barrington Hills village president, said in an interview.

Peterson’s campaign spent more than $137,000 in the last quarter, nearly five times more than McLaughlin, state records show. She had nearly $75,000 left in her campaign account through September while McLaughlin had more than $142,000 on hand.

Peterson in the last quarter received more than $300,000 in in-kind contributions from the state Democratic Party and the House Democrats’ campaign arm, while McLaughlin hasn’t received even close to the same financial backing from Republican groups, records show.

He attributes that lack of support to recriminations over his effort to become the House GOP leader before McCombie was put in the job following a closed-door vote by the caucus.

McLaughlin said he thinks the House Republicans need to be more outspoken about the hundreds of millions of dollars the Prtizker administration has authorized for the influx of migrants who were sent from the southern U.S. border to the Chicago area.

“The leadership needs to be unafraid and unwavering on what they want to move forward with,” McLaughlin said.

Peterson is a resident of North Barrington and a past president of the Barrington Rotary Club. She advocates for LGBTQ+ and abortion rights as well as pro-environmental policies, her campaign website said, noting that she and her husband “compost all their food scraps in order to reduce the amount of atmospheric gasses.”

Also on her agenda is more affordable child care and health care for seniors.

“It’s going to fall on the burden of their children or we’re going to have to come to some sort of resolution,” Peterson said. “Just like child care, how do we manage elderly care and how do we make sure that the caregivers are also paid a livable wage?”

Outgoing incumbent’s top aide looks to take seat

Democrat Amy “Murri” Briel and Republican Liz Bishop are vying for an open House seat in a J-shaped district that stretches from DeKalb south and then west along the Illinois River Valley. The district has been represented since 2019 by Rep. Lance Yednock, a Democrat from Ottawa who chose not to run for a fourth term.

Briel is Yednock’s former chief of staff and said that experience has made her familiar with state government and knowledgeable about what it takes to be a good lawmaker. She said she’s a “pragmatic Democrat” who is willing to listen to different opinions.

A supporter of reproductive freedom, she backs a person’s right “to make decisions about their own body and future, including whether to continue or terminate a pregnancy,” according to her campaign website.

She supported lifting a nearly 40-year moratorium on the construction of nuclear plants in Illinois, an issue that divided Democrats but was eventually passed and signed into law by Pritzker, who had vetoed an earlier iteration of the measure.

The revamped measure sets limits on the size of new nuclear plants and focuses on small modular reactors, a new generation of technology that supporters believe could be an important tool to help the state reach its goal of carbon-free power generation by midcentury.

She wants residents to have better access to health care and said the state “should have some oversight in critical care services.”

Bishop, of La Salle, has served as a deputy state central committeewoman for the state Republican Party and has a background in finance that includes jobs as a bank examiner and auditor. She said she would be an advocate for fiscal responsibility.

“I’m a big believer in you figure out what you have to spend and then you decide how to spend it,” she said. “You don’t decide what you want to spend and then say ‘where am I going to get the money?'”

Bishop agrees with Briel on the need for better health care access, and said she would focus on obtaining more state money into the district for infrastructure projects.

Bishop said she considers herself to be a conservative but doesn’t “wear it on my sleeve.” She said the district is moderate politically and that she needs “to do a lot of listening.”

Through September, Bishop, who has secured financial backing from the House and state GOP, had more than $29,600 in her campaign coffers after spending more than $55,000 in the last quarter, state records show.

Briel received more than $360,000 in in-kind contributions last quarter from the House and state Democrats’ campaign operations, and had more than $95,000 in her account by the end of September.

GOP looking to regain seat flipped two years ago

Freshman Rep. Harry Benton of Plainfield is trying to defend a seat that he flipped after veteran Republican Rep. Mark Batinick stepped down in 2023.

Benton said that as people have gotten to know him he’s receiving a warmer reception in the politically divided district than in years past. He styles himself as “a different kind of Democrat” who has sometimes “bucked my party’s leaders,” in line with the bipartisanship of his Republican predecessor.

His Republican opponent, Gabby Shanahan of Joliet, has criticized Benton for sending out a flyer saying he “supported the elimination of the grocery tax,” when in reality he sat out that vote.

Shanahan, an executive assistant at the right-leaning Illinois Policy Institute, in an interview said the incident was one of “those kind of things that — we need to restore accountability, transparency and integrity back into this office.”

Benton said that he generally supported the idea of eliminating the grocery tax but ultimately decided not to support the legislation when he realized it would have what he saw as an overly negative impact on municipalities.

The freshman representative said some of his biggest accomplishments have been supporting legislation to cut down on so-called junk fees and prescription drug costs.

He has brought in about $1 million since July 1, including a single transfer of nearly half a million dollars from the Illinois House Democrats’ campaign arm, records show.

The organization supporting House Republicans is similarly funneling hundreds of thousands of dollars in support to Shanahan, including in campaign staff, ads and consulting, according to recent disclosures. In total, she has received more than $350,000 since July 1, according to the filings.

Like many of the other candidates for the General Assembly this year, she said her priorities include efforts to lower property taxes and manage inflation and the cost of living. She is endorsed by Batinick, according to her campaign website.

Democrat who flipped seat faces challenge

Freshman Rep. Nabeela Syed of Palatine, at 25 one of the youngest members of the General Assembly, flipped her suburban seat blue two years ago.

It’s “obviously different going into this race as an incumbent” this year, Syed said in a phone interview while out campaigning. “It’s nice as a young person to say that I am the most experienced at this job, I have the most relevant experience at the job.”

Syed has brought in about $750,000 in total contributions since July 1, mostly in hundreds of thousands of dollars in in-kind contributions, which include mailers, ads and staff pay primarily from state Democratic campaign entities. She also received a $50,000 transfer from Pritzker’s campaign fund. She ended September with $430,000 in the bank, according to recent campaign filings.

Asked about the party support for her campaign, Syed said, “They’re realizing what is at stake.”

Her challenger is Tosi Ufodike, a Republican trustee on the Ela Township Board. Ufodike has not received as much financial support from her party as some other candidates in competitive races.

She brought in about $15,000 in both cash and in-kind donations in the last quarter and had about $60,000 in her campaign coffers at the end of September, her campaign filings said.

The district needs “better representation” to address the cost of living and bring down government spending, Ufodike said in an interview.

“Families are tightening their belts and finding savings, and we should too,” she said.

Syed was one of a handful of Democrats, including several considered to be vulnerable in November, to vote against parts of the Democratic-crafted state budget package this spring, which included the $750 million tax hike package. Syed said she felt the vote was more reflective of her district and “frustrations that they might have had with Illinois spending.”

She’s also prioritizing abortion rights and gun reform.

Republican who lost big in ’22 tries again

Few Senate seats are up for grabs this year. But one contentious race could be the south suburban and exurban 40th District, where Democratic Sen. Patrick Joyce of Reddick is facing a rematch with Republican Philip Nagel of Braidwood.

Joyce beat Nagel by about 11 percentage points in 2022 in a district that runs from the south suburbs to encompass most of Kankakee County and parts of Grundy County.

Despite that lopsided loss, the fundraising arm of the state Senate Republicans is supporting Nagel with hundreds of thousands of dollars in both cash and in-kind contributions. In total, the campaign brought in more than $700,000 since July 1 and was also spending big. At the end of September, it had about $13,000 on hand, records show.

Joyce’s campaign has raised close to $2 million since July 1, including $1.2 million in large donations from the Illinois Senate Democrats’ campaign arm this month, according to filings with the State Board of Elections.

“Last cycle, there was a little less money in the race, but we still are working the same program that we worked before, and using my record representing the district to move voters, and it’s effective,” Joyce said.

Top issues vary across the district, from property taxes in Park Forest to estate tax fixes in farm communities, Joyce said. He’s been endorsed by unions including the Illinois AFL-CIO, according to his campaign.

Nagel, who did not respond to a request for an interview, is concerned about the cost of living and would “fight to roll back the soft-on-crime policies,” according to his website.

An Air Force veteran, he has been a vocal opponent of the Chinese company Gotion’s plan to build an electric vehicle battery plant in Manteno. Opponents of the plant have voiced wariness over China’s influence in American manufacturing, but their efforts recently hit a setback when a judge dismissed a citizens group’s lawsuit against the plant.

Joyce said he doesn’t understand the concerns some people have about the plant.

“I’m just not buying into the scare tactic on it, and these are going to be American products made by Illinois workers,” Joyce said.