The Election Unlike Any Other
State Senator Sue Rezin (R-Morris), who ran for Congress in the 14th District in 2020, canceled her election night party and watched results with family and friends (Photo: Sun-Times)
OPINION
I haven’t made any secret of the fact that I’ve spent much of the past decade working on political campaigns around the state. During the 2020 primary, which concluded last March 17th, I was buying ads, serving as spokesman, and advising Vermilion County Treasurer Darren Duncan in the race to replace John Shimkus in the 15th Congressional District.
I tend to remember campaigns I lose more than campaigns I win anyway, but this is one I’ll never forget.
The 15th District, if you aren’t aware, stretches from Danville to the north all the way down to Metropolis on the Ohio River and forms a bit of a “T'“ to the west, almost to St. Louis. It’s a massive district with multiple media markets, and when you’re opponent is being funded by Jim Jordan’s Freedom Caucus, you’re in a hole to start with.
Tuesday, March 17 was the conclusion to a final weekend of campaigning we’ve never seen before.
My candidate had been hitting events in Madison, Washington, Bond, and Richland Counties. But, everywhere we went, news of the “coronavirus” was keeping crowds small and, frankly, starting to worry us a little bit.
I was on my way to Danville for the home stretch, where we would have Darren hit all 33 counties in the final weekend of the campaign. It was Friday the 13th. The day before, the Big Ten Tournament had been canceled and the entire NCAA Tournament a few hours later.
I spent most of Friday morning on the phone with WCIA trying to replace the few thousands of dollars of commercials I had bought for the Big Ten Tournament and NCAA Tournament selection show. Everyone was scrambling.
While on the road late in the afternoon, my wife called and said Governor JB Pritzker just announced he was closing all schools in the state. That’s when we knew something serious was happening that could impact our campaign, our candidate, his family, and the people he came in contact with on the trail.
So we made the decision to pull him off the road for the final weekend of the campaign. Have you ever seen a rabid raccoon in a cage? That’s kind of what it’s like keeping a politician cooped up 72 hours before the polls open..
It was the same feeling Sen. Sue Rezin (R-Morris) had, running in the 14th Congressional District on the other side of the state. That suburban and exurban district had far more moderates and they had to take their door knocking teams off the streets because either nobody answered their door for a stranger or weren’t happy when they saw a stranger at the door.
People were scared.
Surprisingly, there were two counties that went ahead with the traditional Lincoln Day dinners the weekend before the election. People were crowded together and shaking hands. A site you would almost consider impossible a year later.
There was talk of Governor Pritzker attempting to postpone the primary, but we spoke to our lawyers and experts who pretty quickly ruled out that the Governor had any constitutional ability to do so. And, thank goodness, because our campaign was b-r-o-k-e.
We were then tasked with trying to get our voters, many of whom figured their lives were more important than a Congressional primary (the nerve!) to go vote. There was some early voting still available Saturday and Monday, but folks weren’t excited to go stand in line at a County Clerk’s office.
As our campaign manager, Jeff Wilhite, and I pounded through numbers and projections, we were originally planning on an electorate of around 110,000 votes. We knew that even if the “tea party” vote was gone to the Freedom Caucus candidate, we would still have a chance if establishment voters came out.
We hoped traditional Republicans' would vote and the “Trump crowd” would be less likely to vote because the then-President didn’t have a serious race.
Instead, the opposite happened. Trump voters came out, the establishment stayed home, and we got killed.
Rezin, by the way, had a bit of the same problem. Many of the suburban women she was counting on to vote ended up staying home, losing to then-Sen. Jim Oberweis.
Oberweis would lose the fall election.
I hope we never see another election, primary, general, or municipal, like that again. It was uncertain, it was stressful, and it was scary.
Going to vote should never be a frightening experience. Let’s hope it never is again.