At the Illinois State Fair, Democrats seek to portray unity and strength despite internal tensions
Amid internal tensions over the party’s fundraising operations and control, Illinois Democrats gathered for Governor’s Day at the state fair Wednesday and attempted to put on a show of unity in advance of the 2022 election year.
Speaker after speaker at the fairgrounds and a pre-fair brunch cited “science” in embracing the mandates issued by Gov. J.B. Pritzker in an effort to contain the COVID-19 pandemic. They noted the recent spread of the delta variant, primarily among the unvaccinated, to counter attacks on the Democratic governor’s emergency orders by GOP candidates who have refused to promote vaccinations and have repudiated masking policies.
“Who is fighting to protect the lives and the livelihoods of our fellow Illinoisans during this deadly pandemic?” Pritzker asked at his afternoon fairgrounds rally. “Over and over it’s Democrats who deliver for the people of Illinois.”
But the beneath the attacks on Republicans, who will have their day at the fair on Thursday, intraparty tensions were evident and some party leaders were absent from the day’s events.
Pritzker skipped the traditional brunch of the Illinois Democratic County Chair’s Association. House Speaker Emanuel “Chris” Welch was on vacation and missed both the brunch and the afternoon rally for Pritzker. Senate President Don Harmon skipped the fair because of a breakthrough case of COVID-19.
That might have helped avert potentially awkward conversations on topics such as the post-Michael Madigan era restructuring of the Illinois Democratic Party. Earlier this year, Pritzker’s choice for party chairman was rejected in favor of U.S. Sen. Dick Durbin’s pick, U.S. Rep. Robin Kelly of Matteson.
With Democrats holding both U.S. Senate seats, a 13-5 U.S. House majority, all statewide offices and supermajorities in the Illinois General Assembly, Pritzker sought to present a picture of strength and unity in his fairgrounds speech while excusing those who, like himself, weren’t able to attend the day’s full slate.
“There’s some people who try to write that, you know, people are boycotting or not going to something because they don’t want to be there. The truth is that we’re all very busy as you know, everyday,” he said. “I support every Democrat that was at the (event in the) morning.”
Kristina Zahorik, the McHenry County Democratic chair who also leads the statewide county chair’s group, said the party is unified and needs to remain so in the upcoming election season.
“Whatever you may read in the press, Democrats in Illinois are united. There’s too much at stake to be divided,” Zahorik said.
“There is a deep divide between who we are as Democrats and those on the other side, particularly those who follow the cult of fear, the cult of no, the cult of hate and the cult of Trump,” she said. “Government leadership in crisis. Decisive leadership. Roll-up-your-sleeves leadership. Get-your-ass-to-work leadership. That’s what Illinois wants and that’s what we do as Democrats in electing our leaders.”
The state fair’s political days in odd-numbered years traditionally serve as the kickoff to the campaign season and the primary election. But like other traditions altered by the pandemic, Democrat and Republican days this year are not a lead-in to a March primary. Instead, state lawmakers have pushed the primary back to June 28, 2022, leaving plenty of time for new candidates to enter political contests.
Kelly was elected to the state party chair post in a close vote in March to replace Madigan, who resigned the position and his longtime position as House speaker after being implicated in a federal investigation in which Commonwealth Edison admitted to offering Madigan allies jobs and contracts in an effort to win his favor.
But Kelly’s ability to head the party organization is severely limited by her position as a federal elected official, which prohibits her from raising money for state and local candidates because Illinois law allows larger contributions than federal law.
As a result of an advisory position issued by the Federal Election Commission, the party was forced to create a fundraising committee for state candidates. Kelly cannot have any involvement with the committee.
Sign up for The Spin to get the top stories in politics delivered to your inbox weekday afternoons.
On Tuesday, top state Democrats met to create the fundraising panel, but both Welch and Harmon refused to take seats on it, fearing that the fundraising structure would continue to be too complicated to navigate under the federal restrictions on Kelly.
Pritzker, a wealthy heir to the Hyatt Hotel fortune, indicated he would financially back Democrats through his own self-funded “Blue Wave Illinois” fund rather than through the Democratic Party of Illinois.
“There’s an awful lot to look at,” Pritzker said of the party’s new fundraising structure and compliance with the FEC. “But here’s what I know: We’re all going to be supporting Democrats up and down the ticket.”
For her part, Kelly on Wednesday cited the leadership of Pritzker, Welch and Harmon for guiding the state through the pandemic, telling brunch attendees, “We need to make sure we reelect Gov. J.B. Pritzker.”
Durbin credited Pritzker for doing a “remarkable job” during the pandemic and said he was standing behind the Democratic slate for 2022 before shifting to praise of Joe Biden’s presidency and lashing out at Republicans for continuing to embrace Trump.
“They’re in this world where the big lie is the big deal. And the lie continues, certainly in the mind of one former president, that he actually won the election. Well, he didn’t win. The American won that election and Joe Biden is our president,” Durbin said.
The morning brunch crowd, gathered outside in a hotel parking lot because of the pandemic, had thinned considerably by the time a recorded message from Pritzker played on the video screen, inviting fellow Democrats to join him to his afternoon event at the fairgrounds.
That left few in attendance to hear from four candidates vying for the Democratic nomination to succeed longtime Secretary of State Jesse White, who is retiring after six four-year terms.
Chicago Ald. Pat Dowell, 3rd, former Illinois Treasurer Alexi Giannoulias, Ald. David Moore, 17th, and Chicago Clerk Anna Valencia all touted their Democratic credentials and their plans to carry on White’s work of making the office more accessible to the public and further modernize operations.
Dowell, Moore and Valencia also took thinly veiled jabs at Giannoulias, who has an early lead in money and endorsements, for backing former Illinois House GOP leader Tom Cross over then-Democratic state Sen. Mike Frerichs in the 2014 race for treasurer, which Frerichs won.
“This last decade, I’ve been working to get Democrats elected up and down the ticket,” Valencia said, noting work that included running Durbin’s 2014 campaign and helping run a vote-by-mail program that helped elect Frerichs.
For his part, Giannoulias played up his connections to favorite son and former President Barack Obama, who he said introduced him around the room at the Democrats’ 2005 brunch “as a 29-year-old kid running for state treasurer.”
Giannoulias appealed to party unity, calling Illinois “a blue island in the middle of a sea of red.”
“Authoritarianism has taken root right next door to us,” he said. “This upcoming election is about preserving our democracy and our middle-class values.”
