In the Field: Business, Farm Groups at Odds in Sprawling 53rd Senate Race
(L-R): Grundy County Board Chairman Chris Balkema, farmer and high school agriculture teacher Jesse Faber, former Livingston County Board member Mike Kirkton, and former Iroquois County Board member Susan Wynn Bence.
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When appointed Sen. Tom Bennett (R-Gibson City) announced he wouldn’t seek a full term in the Senate this year, both freshman House members, Rep. Dennis Tipsword (R-Metamora) and Rep. Jason Bunting (R-Emington) took a pass on the race, leaving a wide open race for a ruby red senate district covering thousands of square miles in east-central Illinois. Former Sen. Jason Barickman resigned from the seat last year.
The 53rd Senate District (highlighted).
The 53rd covers some 10,000 square miles, stretching from nearly Peoria on the west to the Indiana state line on the east and from nearly Joliet to the north and into Bloomington-Normal to the south.
There are four GOP candidates on the ballot, Grundy County Board Chairman Chris Balkema of Channahon, farmer and agriculture teacher Jesse Faber of Pontiac, horse trainer and former Livingston County Board member Mike Kirkton, and Susan Wynn Bence of Watseka, a former hospital executive and aide to then-Lt. Governor Evelyn Sanguinetti who spent ten years on the Iroquois County Board.
The conventional wisdom of fundraising, organization, and advertising says the campaign is a two-way race between Balkema and Faber. No public polling is available and the only poll released by Balkema had suspect methodology. The other two candidates would argue the conventional wisdom is wrong.
(Disclosure: Faber is a close friend of more than 20 years and his wife/campaign treasurer does bookkeeping for our business. I have no involvement in his campaign. I have also known Wynn Bence most of my life.)
Balkema, a career Caterpillar employee, is backed by the Illinois Chamber of Commerce and Illinois Manufacturers’ Association. Faber has been supported by the Illinois Farm Bureau, Illinois Corn Growers Association, Illinois Soybean Association, and Illinois Beef Association.
Balkema says he wants to work across the aisle to get things done.
“You can stand on principle, but you gotta reach across the aisle to work,” he said. “I, optimistically, feel like there is a lot of ground that we can cover together and get things done. If I’m going to pass a bill, I’ve gotta have Democratic support on it.”
Faber says he wants to fight for small towns throughout the district and state.
“I think that the values of how I grew up and the ways that I want to raise my children and what that means is so focused on things like agriculture and small businesses,” he said. “As someone who has worked with young people his entire life and spent a lot of time trying to educate office holders and officials about agriculture and small business, I believe this district should be represented by somebody who brings that background. “
Kirkton, who lives near Gridley in Livingston County, spent 25 years in the Army and served multiple combat tours during the Gulf War. He said a spirit of service compelled him to run.
“You can either sit around and complain and moan about it or you can step up and do something,” Kirkton said. “If not me, who? That’s the way I look at it.”
Wynn Bence of Watseka in Iroquois County leans on her experience working in the Lt. Governor’s office and for Bennett when he was in the House and his predecessor, former Rep. Josh Harms. She most recently worked as an executive for Gibson Area Hospital before launching her Senate campaign.
She cites experience in the legislative process as her strength.
“I’ve done a lot of research on legislation and I was good at it,” Wynn Bence said. “A lot of the bills I worked on passed and they were signed into law. I learned very quickly how you had to work with both sides of the aisle if you want to get something done.”
None of the four candidates approve of Democratic President Joe Biden or Governor JB Pritzker’s handling of the migrant crisis, and most believe the two Democrats share much of the blame for the problem within Illinois’ border.
“The Governor has been sweeping money from the budget, from budgeted line items, in order to pay for [the migrants], without talking to or getting approval from the legislature,” Kirkton said. “There is no plan to take care of these people. What’s the plan? The taxpayers and the citizens of this state deserve an answer as to what the plan is and how we’re gonna spend the money.”
Wynn Bence said the federal government needs to step up to curb illegal immigration and help migrants.
“It starts at the White House. The only person who can stop the immigration crisis is President of the United States,” she said. “I feel so bad for the families that are coming here because they were led to believe they would get all this free stuff.”
Balkema says he supports closing the border, which, of course, the legislature doesn’t have the ability to do.
“You can’t just keep bringing people in with an open checkbook and [allow] it to have such a negative impact on human life as it is right now,” he said.
Faber says state and local officials need to put pressure on the federal government to handle the situation.
“JB Pritzker put out the welcome mat and he put out a sign that said ‘come to Illinois.’ Now that that’s happening, we’ve got an even bigger humanitarian crisis on our hands along with the safety and security crisis that came with it,” Faber said. “We need to make sure that what we’re doing has substance. And that plan shouldn’t divert resources away from the citizens of Illinois and our veterans and schools and communities.”
All four say they want to see property tax rates reduced, but vary greatly on how to accomplish lower property tax bills.
Balkema endorses a House Republican plan to tie property tax relief for schools to the expected decrease in pension payments over the next decade.
“There are [a lot of] ways you can look at the mandates on schools and find out what we can cut for efficiencies sake,” Balkema said. “Let’s decide what we can do to reduce the bureaucracy and how many jobs that equals. If you look at our neighboring states, the property taxes are, in a lot of cases, half.”
Faber says reducing property taxes is a state and local effort.
“To get to that tax relief, it requires not only the state stepping up and doing their part,” he said. But it requires some willingness of local taxing bodies to pass that relief on to their restaurants and property owners.”
Kirkton says he supports reducing burdens on local governments to help them cut their property tax rates.
“The state continues to send down unfunded mandates and the [local governments] have no way to pay for it,” he said. “Trying to fix the issue at the state level is not really the answer.”
Kirkton says he supports consolidation of school districts and local governments if the idea is locally generated.
While Wynn Bence supports consolidation of local governments, including schools.
“It would make so many resources available to our kids,” she said. “It would eliminate the top-heavy salaries that we pay to administrators. A little school doesn’t need a superintendent and a principal. Why? If it’s just one small district with 100 kids, why do they need both those positions? Consolidate that.”
Faber finished last year with around $17,000 in the bank and has raised around $91,000 in large contributions, $75,000 of which were loans from himself and his father. The Illinois Farm Bureau has also spent money in the district on Faber’s behalf. Balkema ended 2023 with around $32,000 on hand and has raised around $44,000 in large donations this year, including $10,000 from himself. Kirkton had around $1,000 cash on hand at the end of the year and has raised around $11,000 in large donations so far this year, which included around $5,000 from his family business. Wynn Bence didn’t create her campaign finance committee until February 26 and has not reported any large contributions so far.
No Democrat appears on the primary ballot and the district is considered safe for the GOP. President Trump won the district by nearly identical 34-point margins in 2016 and 2020. Republican Darren Bailey won the district by 35-points in the 2022 gubernatorial race.