March 27, 2024
BIGGEST "CHALLENGED UNDERPERFORMERS" (MEANING LOSERS) ARE JOHNSON, HARMON, COOK, TORO

It has been decreed by some that political analysts like me must cease-and-desist from being hurtful. Politicians are sensitive, they say. They’re not stupid or inept, and they’re not losers, just “underperformers,” they say. Now that the March 19 Democratic primary is history, here’s my analysis of  the underperformers, formerly known as losers.

20TH DISTRICT STATE SENATOR: Don Harmon gets a Gold Star for being the “Squanderer of 2024.” If you spend a whole bunch of money you usually win in politics because voters quickly tune-out all rhetoric but remember that name that clogs their mailboxes, annoys them with digital ads and/or clutters broadcast, cable and social media.

So Harmon, the IL Senate president, spent $2.2 million to elect appointed state senator Natalie Toro in a district with a population of 213,250, 90,000 registered voters (RVs), 6 major wards and a usual voter turnout of about 25,000 in 14,000 households – and still lost. In a turnout of 24,371 on March 19 Toro got 7,270 votes to progressive Graciela Guzman’s 12,312, a solid 50.5 percent. Guzman’s moneybag was the CTU, which spent over $1.2 million.

Eating dust were Dave Nayak, who self-funded $800,000 and got 3,735 votes , or 11.6 percent, and Geary Yonker, with 1,054. The CTU/Left strategy succeeded spectacularly. Early mailers linked Toro to FOP president John Catanzara, who endorsed her in 2022 and, by extension, to Trump, who Catanzara endorsed in 2020.

Guzman linked into the network created by congresswoman Delia Ramirez (D-3) and Alderwoman and now committeewoman Susanna Rodriquez Sanchez. Guzman got 59.1 percent in the 1st Ward, 59 in the 35th, 54 in the 33rd and 49.5 in the 30th. 

The enormity of the Toro/Harmon loss and the Guzman/CTU win cannot be under-estimated. It means the CTU is in a position to give the finger to anyone and can pick candidates out of a hat and they can win. It proves the 20th District is the most radical in the state. And it proves money can’t always prevail. Harmon dictated Toro’s strategy, his Springfield staffers ran the campaign, and about 40 mailers clogged mailboxes, causing a stampede to rent roto-rooters. All told, Toro spent $305=per vote, Guzman $97 and Nayak $214 

A notable winner, paradoxically, is Harmon, who squandered $2.2 million but nevertheless cemented his leadership by showing his 39 colleagues that he will spend whatever it takes to re-elect them. That’s the Caucus rule: Always back incumbents. The irony is that Guzman, who won a 2-year term, will be up in 2026 and Harmon will be funding her. Guzman will be around as long as the overlords are happy with her doing what she is told.

45TH WARD: GARDINER/BURKE AVOIDANCE: To avoid? Or not to avoid? That was the question in the 45th Ward’s Democratic committeeperson race. Joe Cook, endorsed state’s attorney candidate Eileen O’Neill Burke, who got 70.1 percent in the ward (6,021 votes), but avoided seeking the endorsement of alderman Jim Gardiner, who was willing to give it. Gardiner won the post 5,557-5,267 in 2020 in a 10,826 turnout. The unofficial 2024 vote is 4,467-3,864 in an 8,331 turnout, down 2,655, or 20 percent. “That was a major reason why I lost,” said Cook, who conceded March 25.
The fact is that the Leftist vote was down by 800 from 2020 while the more centrist, moderate Democratic vote, to which Cook appealed, was down by almost 1,700. And the fact is that Michael Rabbitt’s progressive campaign went negative on Cook by defining him as Gardiner’s choice. He didn’t want to make it about Gardiner and the opposition absolutely made it about Gardiner.

The more plausible reason, however, is that Cook was simply out-campaigned by Michael Rabbitt, out-strategized by the ward’s ever-growing Left base, and overwhelmed by an accumulated Rabbitt/LaPointe/Arena database which pinpointed exactly who their past voters are. 

“I knocked on 10,000 doors,” said Rabbitt,  who began campaigning in Aug. 2023, often with state rep Lindsey LaPointe (D-19). “We would engage” voters, “talk issues,” download data, use the data and “lock-in our voters,” he said. Rabbitt had 5 mailers. Cook admits that he would knock on every door of everybody who voted Democrat once in the past 3 primaries.
Cook, despite endorsing Burke, needed to do more to identify himself given how well she did.
She got 6,026 votes to Cook’s 3,864. Rabbitt made no endorsement for CCSA. Harris got 2,572 votes, far less than Rabbitt’s 4,457. And Cook could have been loudly anti-Johnson, anti-Wealth Tax. That blew 2,000 votes. The pro-taxers numbered 3,842, so about 2,000 anti-taxers voted for Rabbitt.

“I had a strategy,” Cook said. Trouble is the Leftists have a movement. Rabbitt’s 603-vote win equates to an 8-point spread – 54-46 percent. Of the ward’s 29 precincts, Rabbitt won 19, two with over 70 percent, 10 with over 60 and 7 with 50-59. Cook’s percent breakouts were 1, 3 and 6. He swept Edgebrook/Wildwood, his home base, and won 5 north Gladstone precincts

Rabbitt won every other precinct south of Bryn Mawr to Irving Park, and lost Gardiner’s home precinct by 45 votes. Rabbitt won all 10 Jefferson Park precincts (Foster to Montrose) and the 6 Portage Park precincts down to Old Irving and Independence Park. The 2022 remap sliced-off 6 precincts (while adding that number up north), 3 north of Irving west of Lavergne and south of Hutchinson, adding them to the 38th Ward, plus 3 south of Irving. That, said Rabbitt, cost him 600-800 votes, as he would have won each precinct by 100-125 votes.

INCOMPETENCE AT CCDP: Democrats worship at the altar of Diversity/Equity/Inclusion (DEI), and so do Democratic voters. When given a choice between a man and a woman, the man loses. According to unofficial tallies, Commissioner Dan (Pogo) Pogorzelski, elected to fill a vacancy in 2022 by 1,991 votes, lost to Sharon Waller. The vote is 246,238-235,409 a margin of 10,823.

This outcome is the absolute fault of the Cook County Democratic Party. The CCDP gives all 22 slated candidates $45,000 (or 990K) to be on the 5 countywide mailers. But they were crap, blathering about Trump, abortion and guns. Pogo and Clayton Harris appear they have lost, although quite picked up a net of about 8,000 votes since March 19. The latest vote as of March 25 has Burke up 260,873-258,910, a margin of 1,963. That’s going to continue to dwindle down.

BRING CHICAGO HOME: Just when you think Chicago is really in the pits, Chicago voters do something really intelligent – like rejecting Mayor Brandon Johnson’s binding referendum to force the council to raise the transfer tax on real estate sales over $1 million. That affects multi-unit and commercial properties more than homes. The $100 million in new revenue was going to be used to “combat homelessness,” promised Johnson. Yeah, give me the money first, and then I’ll tell you what the plan is. Voters smelled through that.

Read more Analysis & Opinion from Russ Stewart at Russstewart.com

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