THE ILLINOIZE: Divide in the House GOP may save Durkin...How far have HGOP prospects fallen?...Ten House races to watch...Why I call the Proft pieces "fake newspapers"
September 27, 2022
Good morning, Illinois.
Welcome to the final six weeks of the fall campaign. The General Election is 42 days from today.
Governor Pritzker will hold a news conference on repaying the hole in the Unemployment Insurance Trust Fund in Chicago at 9am. He’ll be endorsed by the Gun Violence Prevention PAC tin Aurora at 11:30. The Bailey campaign has not released a public schedule.
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Let’s get to it.
HOUSE GOP FACING POTENTIAL LOSSES, DIVIDED ON LEADERSHIP
House Republicans appear divided into three camps leading into the November election, which could spell the end of House Republican Leader Jim Durkin’s (R-Western Springs) tenure leading the caucus.
We told you in July there was a “growing dissatisfaction” among some House Republicans over Durkin, who has led the GOP caucus since 2013. As the General Election approaches and the House GOP has yet to air a single television ad for its candidates, three distinct factions appear to be forming within the caucus. Two of which want Durkin’s ouster but may not be able to agree on a potential replacement.
Many Republican members we spoke to are frustrated Durkin aligned himself with billionaire Ken Griffin in the June primary, leading to millions of dollars of funding never coming to fruition.
“He put all of his eggs in one basket and had no backup plan to raise money,” a top Republican insider said. “Once Ken Griffin fled for Florida, our chance to pick up seats in the House flew away with him.”
The Eastern Bloc, a group of conservative lawmakers from mostly southeastern Illinois and is closely aligned with GOP gubernatorial nominee Sen. Darren Bailey (R-Xenia). The group is expected to have its own candidate to challenge Durkin. Most believe Rep. Dan Caulkins (R-Decatur) will be the choice, though Caulkins said in July that he was not “seeking or soliciting” the position.
A group of mostly suburban traditional Republicans has also formed in possible opposition to Durkin. Rep. Tim Ozinga (R-Mokena) is mentioned as a possible candidate as is Rep. Marty McLaughlin (R-Barrington Hills).
McLaughlin did not comment on the record when contacted by The Illinoize Monday.
Sources say McLaughlin met with Eastern Bloc members last week, though the two sides did not agree on a path to agreeing on a candidate to potentially coalesce around. It is expected a McLaughlin/Ozinga block would be more likely to side with Durkin than the Eastern Bloc if the vote is deadlocked.
Another complicating factor for Durkin is that he will lose nearly half of his leadership team in the new General Assembly, who either sought another office or lost a primary.
Durkin supporters dismissed the potential challengers as “squawking” by a handful of unhappy members. Multiple members of the GOP caucus tell us they’re concerned the party could lose seats in November when, before the primary, some Republicans crowed about winning 15 seats and taking back the House majority for the first time since two years in power from 1994-1996.
The November performance for outspent GOP candidates could be the deciding factor of whether Durkin can survive.
TEN HOUSE RACES TO WATCH
There are 78 House races this November in which a Republican and Democrat appear on the ballot, but how many are actually competitive?
Just 24 of those contested races were won by either Bruce Rauner or JB Pritzker by fewer than ten points in 2018.
Of those, 12 were within five points in 2018.
House Democrats are on television in at least 12 contested races so far while House Republicans are on the air in zero.
Some top races to watch:
41st District: Rep. Janet Yang Rohr (D-Naperville) vs. Rich Janor (D+3)
42nd District: Rep. Terra Costa-Howard (D-Glen Ellyn) vs. Stefanie Hood (D+5)
45th District: Rep. Deanne Mazzochi (R-Elmhust) vs. Jen Ladisch Douglass (R+5)
48th District: Azam Nizamuddin (D) vs. Jennifer Sanalitro (R)
51st District: Rep. Chris Bos (R-Lake Zurich) vs. Nabeela Syed (R+9)
53rd District: Rep. Mark Walker (D-Arlington Heights) vs. Jack Vrett (D+5)
54th District: Mary Beth Canty (D) vs. Michele Hunter (D+4)
66th District: Rep. Suzanne Ness (D-Crystal Lake) vs. Connie Cain (D+2)
83rd District: Rep. Keith Wheeler (R-Oswego) vs. Matt Hanson (D +6)
91st District: Sharon Chung (D) vs. Scott Preston (R) (D+6)
We’ll do our best to dig into each of these races over the next six weeks.
MORE ON THE PROFT PAPERS
I’ve had a lot of pushback from the right as I’ve called out the clearly political mail pieces sent out by Dan Proft’s “People Who Play By The Rules” PAC disguised as legitimate newspapers.
Crain’s has a good editorial that echoes many of my concerns:
We live in a time when independent, nonpartisan journalism is increasingly rare—and more necessary than at any other moment in living memory.
With shouts of “fake news” echoing in their minds, people who care about the world around them and the fate of our fragile democracy find it harder than ever to find trustworthy sources of verified, unbiased and balanced information. In other words, journalism. Which is why it’s disappointing to see the leaders of one such news organization—the Daily Herald—make a move that blurs the line between fact and fiction.
Mimicking the look and feel of actual newspapers, these publications, sporting names like “Chicago City Wire” and “West Cook News,” make inflammatory claims about the policies of Gov. J.B. Pritzker, Mayor Lori Lightfoot and other public officials, complete with splashy headlines on flashpoint topics ranging from cash bail and crime to property taxes and COVID policy. In short, they are propaganda. And when these publications started hitting the street, there was reason to wonder where they came from and who was paying for them. Their pages contained next to no such disclosure.
It eventually came to light that these imitation newspapers were being printed by Paddock Publications’ commercial printing arm and distributed with a postage permit registered to Paddock.
We’re not talking about slick pamphlets, brochures or posters here—the kind of material that voters are accustomed to finding in their mailboxes, stuck into their doorjambs or pressed into their hands as they run for the train during campaign season. We’re talking about deceptively designed mailers that are clearly meant to simulate newspapers—printed and evidently distributed by a company that, however inconveniently in this case, happens to be in the news business.
They are the definition of fake news.
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I don’t understand, these clearly political newspapers do not have any political disclosures in them? If they do what is the problem? You have an extremely weak argument that a newspaper company subsidiary should not publish content you don’t like in a form you don’t like. And please spare me the argument that newspapers are the last bastion of truth and unbiased reporting.