An Election Guide

Illinois’s 1^st Congressional District

Illinois’s 1^st Congressional District covers more than half of the South Side of Chicago and a large portion of the southwest suburbs.  The incumbent representative, Bobby Rush, is seeking to win a thirteenth consecutive term. Rush—a former city councilman, mayoral hopeful, and member of the Black Panther   party—represented the district during its first expansion into the suburbs in the nineties, and in 2014 after the boundaries expanded even further toward Joliet and Palos Park. He has never won a primary or a general election by anything less than a landslide, even when Barack Obama challenged him in 2000.

His biggest challenger this time around is Howard Brookins, the alderman of the 21^st Ward since 2003. Brookins has received the endorsement of the 13^th Ward Democratic Organization, which is run by Speaker of the Illinois House Michael Madigan, who also faces a contentious election this year. He grew up admiring Rush and even helped aid Rush’s 2000 re-election campaign against Obama, but recently told reporters that Rush is “phoning it in,” and blasted Rush for an ongoing Ethics Committee investigation that is trying to determine whether Rush received illegal free rent on his campaign office. Rush’s other challenger, Patrick Brutus, voiced the same concerns.

Rush responded to these criticisms by calling Brookins a “loser.” “I foolishly wasted my time to help this ingrate become state’s attorney,” he said. Rush endorsed Rahm Emanuel in 2015 and, according to the Tribune, has received financial support from some of Emanuel’s closest political allies. According to the 2010 census, the 1^st District is over 60% black, one of the highest percentages in the country.

Illinois House of Representatives District 26

 Back in 2012, when Christian Mitchell first ran in the Democratic primary to be state representative for the 26th District—a thin, long sliver of land that stretches from Navy Pier to South Chicago—he won by just over 500 votes. Two years later, he widened his margin slightly, defeating community organizer Jhatyn “Jay” Travis in the 2014 primary with 556 votes to spare. On March 15, he and Travis will face each other again; the Weekly described the pair’s 2012 matchup as “Chicago’s most important primary.” (You can read the full article here.)

Perhaps the most prominent issue where the two clash is public education: Mitchell supports charter schools—though he has helped pass legislation that would institute greater charter accountability—while Travis, who organized with the Kenwood Oakland Community Organization to prevent school closings, has called for “a moratorium on harmful and unproven school closings and charter school expansion.”

Mitchell has presented himself as a pragmatic politician, telling the Hyde Park Herald, “I think the major theme of this campaign is not just who is going to be an effective progressive, I think that’s what this community demands but also who has concrete plans to deliver on the kind of future that we all want to see.” But Travis, who sees herself as the more progressive choice, has slammed him for his record, which includes votes for SB1, a pension reform bill, and against an elected school board. (Mitchell now says he supports it, but cautions that it’s not “a panacea to our education woes.”)

Mitchell has collected endorsements from the Tribune and Sun-Times, as well as Cook County President Toni Preckwinkle and Alderman Will Burns, both of whom he once worked for. Travis has been endorsed by the Chicago Teachers Union, Alderwoman Sue Garza, and former mayoral candidate Jesus “Chuy” Garcia.

Illinois House of Representatives District 2

When Edward Acevedo, the 2nd District’s representative since 1997, announced that he would be resigning from his seat, he tried to convince the committeemen from his district to appoint his son, Alex Acevedo, to immediately fill the vacancy.The suggestion was rejected in an effort spearheaded by Committeeman John Daley (yes, part of that Daley family). Instead, the younger Acevedo will be running against Theresa Mah, a former college professor and policy advisor to Pat Quinn.

After redistricting in 2010, the consolidation of different parts of Chinatown into the traditionally Latino 2nd District meant that the share of the Asian American voting-age population jumped up to nearly a quarter of the district’s total, turning the election into something of a test of Asian American voting power. Mah herself was part of the effort to redraw the district, which, in addition to most of Chinatown, includes Bridgeport, McKinley Park, and Pilsen. Acevedo, meanwhile, has been accused of ignoring the Asian American population completely: after protesters disrupted the rally where U.S. Representative Luis Gutiérrez endorsed Mah, Gutiérrez told WBEZ that Acevedo’s campaign has been reminiscent of the Chinese Exclusion Act.

Allegations of bad behavior have also dogged both campaigns. In an email from her campaign, Mah claimed that, at the Gutiérrez event, an “angry mob… shouted racial slurs and tried to physically intimidate” her supporters. And Rich Miller’s Capitol Fax blog posted pictures from a reader showing a Mah supporter handing out her campaign materials at an early voting location, which is illegal under Illinois state law.

Acevedo, who has worked as a nurse for the last five years, writes on his website that, if elected, he will work to reduce healthcare inequality. Apart from that, he’s been mostly quiet on the issues. (He didn’t fill out the Tribune’s editorial board questionnaire.) Mah, for her part, told the Tribune she wants to close corporate tax loopholes and levy a higher tax rate on millionaires; she also opposes an expansion of charter schools. Mah has been endorsed by the Tribune, Sun-Times, Alderman George Cardenas and former mayoral candidate Jesus “Chuy” Garcia, while Acevedo has won the support of the AFL-CIO, which represents a number of different unions.