GOP Sees Supreme Court Hopes Dwindling After Brewing Primary Upset
Former Lake County Sheriff Mark Curran surprised numerous observers as he leads Lake County Judge Daniel Shanes in the GOP primary for the new 2nd District on the Supreme Court of Illinois. Curran leads Shanes by about 1,500 vote with an unknown number of mail-in absentee votes still out.
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A Republican primary for an open seat on the Illinois Supreme Court is too close to call more than 80 hours after the polls closed. But some top GOP observers fear the result could be the difference in Republicans winning the court back for the first time in decades.
In the newly drawn 2nd District, which includes Lake, McHenry, Kane, Kendall, and DeKalb Counties, Lake County Judge Daniel Shanes, the establishment pick for the spot trails former Lake County Sheriff Mark Curran, who was the GOP nominee for U.S. Senate in 2020, by around 1,500 votes. 96% of the expected vote had been counted by Thursday evening.
The result is unexpected, considering Shanes raised more than $250,000 during the campaign and Curran reported no large contributions in the past quarter after filing with just $10,000 in funds.
Some Republican operatives we spoke with between Curran’s unexpected result came from residual name ID from his time as Lake County Sheriff as well as a ballot position putting him at the top of the list of candidates. The race also appeared near the end of the ballot.
Whichever candidate wins the nomination faces a tall task in Lake County Judge Elizabeth Rochford, who won the Democratic primary Tuesday.
Curran did not return a message from The Illinoize Thursday evening. The Shanes campaign says it will wait for late arriving mail-in ballots to be counted before deciding their next steps, though, privately, sources say the Shanes camp is not optimistic it can overcome the deficit.
