Biggest 2026 Primary Races to Watch in Chicago

Today on CityCash, Chicago, the 26 primary elections are right around the corner, my friends. So we're talking about some of the biggest races we're watching. It's Monday, January 12th. I'm Jacoby Cochran, and this is what Chicago is talking about. I've got executive producer Simone Ali Say it in the building. How are you feeling, my friend? Hey, I'm all right. Ready to dig into a very busy primary here. How are you? I'm beyond ready. This is what our third set of federal primaries since we started the podcast. We've done the mayoral election or presidential election. We are old hat at this point. But I know there are some people who are listening going, hold on, hold on, hold on her own. I don't have to go into the voters booth for like another two months. I was going to wait a few weeks, maybe wait six or seven to really jump into all the voter guys. Why are y'all starting so fast? And the reason is because while you can vote up until March 17th, in some cases, you can start voting as early as next month. And so we figured we should start setting the stage for, as Simone just pointed out, what's going to be a... like a really important election just by way of we've got some long-term Illinois politicians retiring. And so there will be new faces in Congress and the Senate. And then of course across some of our county and state races. So Simone, what are some of those important dates we should be looking out for? So right away, as you say, the first day to begin sending in your mail-in ballot, if you vote by mail, is February 5th, which is just a few weeks away at this point. And then early voting in person starts March 2nd. So just a month after that. And then, of course, March 17 is primary day, St. Patrick's Day. Also, I will say, the fifth anniversary of City Cash Chicago. So the election is only the second or maybe third most important thing happening that day. Happening that day, yeah. And so, so yeah, that's kind of the timeline here. But, you know, the candidates have been out here, Jacoby. They have been, you know, the certification of like petitions and stuff, you know, only happened, you know, late November last year. But I feel like we've already been talking about this for so long. And I'm ready that now it's like, okay, we know. for sure who's going to be on the ballot. So let's dig into kind of what they're about and what are some big races to watch regardless of, you know, what congressional district you live in. Exactly. And one of those reasons is because towards the middle of last year, we got one of our first big retirees to announce. And that was U.S. Senator Dick Durbin, who has served in that position since the late 90s, has, you know, pretty much run unencumbered for most of his time in office. You know, in Illinois, we traditionally have this like sort of upstate, downstate split between our senators. And he has been the, maybe for lack of better words, the downstate senator for the better part of almost 30 years. Yeah, this is a huge. As soon as this announcement came down last year, people came out kind of left and right to announce their, their candidacy. There is a total of,

A, because those primaries tend to be more competitive. And B, because for the seats that we're going to be talking about, these are districts and seats that have not gone Republican in a long time. But let's talk about the Senate race, Jacoby. Let's start with the lieutenant governor, Juliana Stratton, someone who's born and raised in Chicago, state in Illinois for education. And her background is largely... in public safety and criminal justice reform. She's worked on a lot of these like advisory councils and committees and things like that. She was elected to the State House of Representatives in 2016 with an endorsement from Obama. You're going to hear his name a lot in this conversation, I think. Everybody fishing for that. For that Obama endorsement. Yeah. And then J.B. Pritzker picked Stratton as his running mate in the 2018. gubernatorial election. And that's kind of where she's been since, where she's worked on a lot of those same issues. I was going to say she chairs the governor's rural affairs council, the Illinois Council on Women and Girls, oversees the justice equity and opportunity initiative. You know, in a way, I do wonder if her running for this seat is. kind of a secret way for J.B. Pritzker to figure out if he will have his policies will have national appeal in, say, 2028, you know, because her platform reads very similar to stuff we have heard J.B. Pritzker say. You know, she says she supports Medicare for all, talking about tax incentives for housing construction. You know, I think her platform is, I think. It's the one that sounds least like your typical congressional Democrat. It's maybe the most progressive of the three frontrunners that we're going to talk about today. You know, she's looking at stuff like... use of AI in setting rents or screening applicants, of which there was like a big issue of that in Chicago pretty recently, a DOJ lawsuit around that kind of thing. There's a story that we can link to by Capital News, Illinois, that kind of lays out some of their platforms. And, you know, there's a quote in that story that says Stratton's proposal, quote, is calling for the most aggressive tax hikes and cuts with... tax hikes on the wealthy and tax cuts on those who are low income. So definitely familiar. If you are familiar with anything that J.B. Pritzker has tried to do here in Illinois will sound familiar to two voters, I think. I will say when it comes to raising the federal minimum wage, though, she probably had the most tepid of these three candidates with Krishnamorthy wanting to raise it to $15, but tie it to an inflation. Kelly wanting it to get up to about $17 by 2030 and Stratton just wanting to get to $15, which has become the new national benchmark for. At this point, though, it's almost old. It's super all right. We should be talking about.

Plus 20 at this point, but... Well, and the minimum wage in Chicago right now exceeds $15. The standard minimum wage and the tipped minimum wage, of course, starting to catch up to that. But the federal minimum wage has been at $7.25 and $25 for now 16 years. Yeah. Which, you know, that's what things cost now, right? 16 years ago, things cost exactly the same as they did back then. The one other thing that sort of speculation that people talk about is with Giuliana Stratton is the fact that she is running against U.S. Representative Robin Kelly. And there is this fear that having two... Black women, well-known black women, is going to split some votes. I feel like this is election bingo. Yes. Like we can't talk about election with, is the black vote going to get split? I don't think it's necessarily, you know, totally out of the realm of possibility. We see that happened in the mayor's race, right? Where vote splitting. Along racial lines or along political lines, you know, can happen. A little background on Robin Kelly. She was born in New York, but was educated at Bradley University in Peoria and later at Northern Illinois University. She was first elected to the state house in 2002. And she defeated an incumbent in that primary. She was elected to the second congressional district in 2013. And that was a special election after Jesse Jackson June. Jr. resigned three weeks after winning his own election. And we're going to talk about Jesse Jackson Jr. a little later in this conversation. Keyback. Yeah. Spoiler. But he resigned as a result of corruption issues. He was convicted on misusing campaign and stealing campaign dollars from his campaign. And so a little bit of intrigue there. Yeah, the second district goes from... Chicago's, like, very southeast side, but up to, like, 43rd Street, I think, down along the Indiana border, out into Kankakee, and I think it stops around Danville, so like just short of champagne area. I think during her time leading the district, it'd become... it had overtaken the first district as the district most populated by black Chicagoans and black Illinoisans. And as far as her platform goes, as you mentioned, supports raising the minimum wage, also supports Medicare for all. And she's also looking at capping annual rent increases, a minimum tax on the wealthy. So, yeah, I think a very similar, you know, all of their positions are relatively similar, right? To be perfectly fair, you know, there's sort of differences in, in certain issues, but generally, you know, are positionally similar. And I think similar to what we've talked about with Stratton, which again, it all brings up the question of like, how do you differentiate between these candidates when, you know, what are you looking for here?

Yeah, and then over to Representative Roger Chris Nomorothy, who is currently leading, I think recent polls had him at about 30%. Is that correct? Yeah, he's leading in polling and he's leading in fundraising. He represents the 8th District, which is a northwest suburban district. So you're thinking like Park Ridge out toward, and it includes like parts of Des Plains, and then you're out towards Schaumburg and Elgin. It's kind of a... you know, wiggly looking district. It's been interesting to see how he has been able to make a name for himself, both in Illinois statewide and in D.C. He was born in India, but his family moved to Buffalo, New York when he was a baby. He, you know, and then they moved to Peoria a little bit later. He left for school, came back. He worked on Obama's House and presidential campaigns. There's that Obama again. He worked in the Attorney General's office, the treasurer's office. He had some previous political primary losses when he initially ran for the 8th District, actually. He lost. But he was eventually elected there in 2016. Of all three candidates, this is the person who I have seen most on my TV screen. He's spending that money for sure. It's been most memorable because he focuses a lot on like, you know, it's Krishna Morthy. It's how you pronounce it. Like he really leans into sort of his bona fides to this point. You even say earlier, you think he's the one who's most controlling his Wikipedia page. I have a, yeah, my conspiracy theory is I think there I was, as I was looking at the Wikipedia pages for these three candidates, his is by far the most. filled. There's a lot going on on that Wikipedia page. And I think just this week he got the largest federal employee union endorsement as well. He's playing the game. As far as Christian Morty's specific policy proposals, you know, he's also focused on housing affordability with first-time homebuyer tax credits rezoning for residential developments and making it maybe a little easier to build stuff. Also limiting LLCs or businesses from buying up homes. Some other stuff that I think, economic stuff that I think is really interesting is he's proposing antitrust legislation targeting grocery stores, right? We've talked about the big grocery mergers and how that might affect grocery prices. Universal free school lunch, basically at least one, getting funding for schools to provide at least one free meal to all kids. And also laws to. Maybe curb tariffs, basically targeting these presidential emergency powers that Trump has invoked in order to enact these really draconian tariffs, which I know have affected a lot, a lot of industries and a lot of businesses.

He is also the candidate who has taken the most from GOP aligned donors. He's given some of it back and has said it only represents a small fraction of the $24 plus million he's raised. But it's another reminder. I just read this morning that some of the biggest. you know, Democratic and Republican donors from J.B. Pritzker to the U-Line family, they are opening up their pockets once again for the candidates they want to see when. And Krishna-Morthy has received money from, you know, essentially both sides of the aisle. Yeah, which, you know, doesn't necessarily mean anything in and of itself, but it always raises the question of, you know, if... Who is giving you money? Does that mean you are going to be inclined to do things for those people who give you money, right? And especially depending on how much and how often. And so that's why we kind of watch that campaign finance stuff. Like I said, there are a lot more candidates who are running for Senate. These are the three front runners. I do think it's worth noting on the GOP side. There is going to be a Republican primary. And there's at least one name that is maybe halfway recognizable to folks. And that's Don Tracy, who is based in Springfield. He was the former GOP party chair in Illinois. And he got some coverage when he quit. kind of abruptly in 2024 right before the RNC. And basically, he was kind of fed up with the intra-party fighting. You know, he was somebody who was not MAGA aligned. But of course, that is the party, and that is the way it has gone. And so, you know, I will be kind of curious to see, you know, who ends up being the Republican candidate and how. far along they are on that, on that maga line. Over to some congressional races that are being shaped by some of these candidates. Of course, I'm talking about the second district where Robin Kelly stepped down to run for Senate and in the eighth district where Roger Chris Namorothy is running, is moving away from. So let's start with the second district. Yeah, so there's 12 total candidates in that district, 10 Democrats, so another very crowded primary there. Some of the big names that I think we'll be looking at, we'll looking at again, Jesse Jackson Jr., rerunning for the seat that he resigned from. You know, I think he's hoping that this might be a possible redemption story for him, you know, but he's actually third in fundraising. So I don't know if he's kind of coasting on that. I do think he's absolutely one of the most recognizable names, right? So certainly not someone to count out.

just because of his past. The fundraising leader in this race is state senator Robert Peters, and he is also somebody who is kind of out here playing the game right now. Like he is out here campaigning. You know, he's been giving interviews. He's really kind of talking about his platform. I think, you know, is kind of probably going to emerge as the frontrunner here in this race. The I think it's worth mentioning the second leading fundraiser in this race is Cook County Commissioner Donna Miller. So those are kind of the front runners in in that race. Yeah, I will say just over the last five years we've been doing this podcast, Robert Peters, the Illinois State Senator, is one of those individuals I have seen at more rallies, more political events, uses their social media pretty well to kind of connect with voters. And so I'm interested to see where people fall because while. Jackson, Jr., without a doubt, has the most name recognition. I also think for a lot of voters, he has the most baggage, as we've talked about. And I think about half of, in recent polls, about 80% of the people know his name, about half of those people view him unfavorably. And so I'm interested to see how this race shapes out. Again, the first and the second historically have been. two of the most politically important districts for black Chicagoans. And so I'm interested to see if come the end of March, we got two Jackson's running those. Potentially. In the 8th district to replace Krishna Morathi, again, these are names that I am a little less familiar with because they have maybe some more recognition in the northwest suburbs where this district is. But one person who's running, former U.S. rep Melissa Bean, so she actually was the 8th Congressional District Representative up until she lost to Republican Joe Walsh in 2010. And that was sort of a post-Obamacare, you know, where we got that kind of Republican backlash, particularly, I think, in suburban districts. You know, since she left political office, she'd been working in various finance jobs. And Bean, so Bean's trying to reclaim her seat. And she has a... launched and is launching a really big ad campaign here in January. And so I think we're probably going to be seeing, or at least voters in that district, are going to be seeing a lot more of her. Another person who voters might recognize is Junete Ahmed. He has run against Krishnamorthi a couple of times. And actually in 2024, managed to get 30% of the vote in that primary.

You know, so he has no previous political experience. He, you know, comes to this more from the activist side of things. And we have a couple candidates like that in congressional races. And but he does have the most cash on hand of the of the. Yeah, of the candidates in this district. I think it's worth noting there is going to be a debate among all eight candidates on January 15th. And we can post a link to that as well. So from the two districts where their current representative is moving on to seek higher office to two districts where their nearly 30-year representatives have decided. They don't want it. They don't want no more. They're ready to go home, be with their kids and a grandkids. Maybe they're grandkids at this point. These are our two most elder statespeople in all of Illinois politics. And of course, I'm talking about my district, the seventh district with long-term congressperson, Danny Davis, and your district, the ninth with Jan Shikowski. Yeah, I can start with the ninth here just because that is my district. This is where I live. And there are some 20 candidates. This is probably the race we, like one of the races we covered the earliest. Earlyest. And well, and I'm going to get to kind of why that is. But after Jan Shikowski announced relatively early last year that she was not planning to seek re-election. This race just filled to the brim of those 20 candidates, I think, you know, 17, 19 even maybe are Democrats. This is, you know, this is a heavy, heavy, heavy Democratic district. And it covers, you know, the north side of Chicago where I live, but also up, kind of up the North Shore, Evanston and some of the other northern suburbs as well. You know, I think the biggest name so far, shockingly, already, it's kind of already boiling down to a two-man race, potentially. And those two people are Kat Abugazale, who we spoke with earlier this year. She jumped into the race actually before Shikowski said she was going to retire. So she was planning to challenge Shikowsky for this seat. Abu Ghazale... kind of came to fame as the you know gen z candidate um she's she's a young woman uh does not have political uh experience in political office um but also comes from that more activist background she only moved to chicago in 2024 so she's also new to the area um but when we talk about people playing the game Getting out there, she's it. You know, she did a lot in her early campaign. She did a lot of like mutual aid style events, you know, giving away food, diapers. She was famously out on the front lines of protests against ice and, you know, was taken to the ground a couple times, tear gas out in Broadview. Yeah, I saw a video where she was shoved to the ground.

Wow. Yeah. Yeah. You know, and so has really made a name for herself. And I see her signs everywhere in my neighborhood. I see them all over the place. You know, so for somebody who moved to this area a year ago, a little over a year ago and is sort of making this, making this run, I think very impressive. And polling shows that. You know, it's it's her and Evanston mayor, Daniel Biss. Daniel Biss, also somebody who has been on the front lines in Broadview and has come out against ICE very heavy. A pretty popular politician in Evanston. And. I think has, you know, has previously served in other political offices as well. He actually, so he has quite a bit of political experience. He also got the endorsement, Shikowsky's endorsement, just in the past week or so. And so those two are the top two polling in this super, super crowded primary. And I think. You know, I think very interesting race there. I am surprised that I haven't seen more from some of the other recognizable names in this race. State Representative Han Wyn, who is also my state representative in Springfield. And state senator Mike Simmons, also my state senator in Springfield. And then another name that... Folks maybe will remember Bush Romuala. She's currently on the Skokie School Board. But she got a lot of attention in 2018 as she ran for Cook County Board as a teenager. And she was kind of the Gen Z young darling of that election cycle. And so sort of the stepping stone maybe for someone like Kat to run. But yeah, really, really crowded, but already starting to see. this field narrow, at least in kind of the public eye. The ninth district has historically had a large Jewish population. And so one thing I'm interested in seeing is as we get closer to the race, you know, how strong Abu Ghazali and Biss come out to talk about not only the expansion of ice in our region, both of them having been outside of Braview, but also about the ongoing genocide. In Palestine, both of them have put in their sort of political positions that they believe criticism against Israel should not be punished, that people should have the freedom to protest given. You know, the protests at Northwestern and the federal pressure they've been under. On those issues and sort of on similar places where we see kind of divides among Democrats, right? Those are going to be things that I'll be interested in. I think in that case, BIS maybe kind of on papers has a wider appeal just as somebody who has been playing the political game for a while and like has had to balance those interests in Evanston.

Because they certainly, trust me, as someone who went to Northwestern, I can tell you, they exist. Those divides are absolutely present. Whereas Abu Ghazale, you know, again, comes in it with a really, really strong activist bit. And then over to my district in the 7th where since, I believe, 1996, Danny Davis has been the representative. He announced his retirement last year and through his endorsement behind. Illinois State Representative Lashon Ford, who grew up on the west side, a Chicago public school teacher, someone who's involved in real estate and has served in political office for years now at this point. I'd argue even though he has never run to lead the 7th congressional district, he has run for the mayor seat, for example, and lost. And so he has made it clear that he has some political aspirations. And again, he has a track record in the statehouse for leading criminal justice reform, for education investment. He is someone who has made his platform really lift up addiction services and resources for the unhoused across Chicago. I also feel like he's one of the most, you know, when it comes to our state legislators, sometimes I find it really hard to remember who's who and what's what because there are so many. There are different Senate and House districts. But Lechon Ford is somebody whose name I absolutely recognize. And he's constantly doing, you know, constituent work here in Chicago and is like constantly commenting on stuff that is happening in the city. policy-wise, and it absolutely is making that connection to Springfield in a way that, you know, he's really kind of out there doing that a lot. He chaired the Firearm Public Awareness Task Force and was vocal around the assault weapons ban. He is one of the proponents for broader hemp legislation so that those small businesses that are selling hemp-derived products can continue but better regulated. He helped co-found the West Side Heroin Task Force 10 years ago, something that has been in the news recently. So I agree with you. He has a lot of name recognition, has the major endorsements, but he is facing off against 14 other. candidates, including two people who have run this race before and have finished second to Danny Davis previously, including current. Treasurer Melissa Conyers Irvin, who finished second in 2024 with 21% of the vote. She's trying again. She has spent most of her life in the 7th District, and that's really what she's running on. Kina Susan Collins, an organizer who has run multiple times in the 7th District. And in 2022, put up a big fight in the primary, winning 46% of the vote.

to Danny Davis's 52 or so percent at the time. And so both of those women are back in the field. Polling behind for at this time. And I do think given that Danny Davis has maintained despite some close races, so much political capital. I imagine his endorsement. is going to sway voters in a way that I don't know if we could say the same across the second, the eighth and the ninth. Those endorsements matter and are important similar to the race for Senate. But I'd argue this endorsement may have the most staying power amongst their constituency. Yeah, well, in the same way that the first and now the second district, you know, kind of represent. or sort of bake up the core of like black political life. And on the south side, the 7th district is sort of what that is on the west side, right? The district largely centered around Chicago stretches through some parts of the near south side, thinking Englewood, Bronzeville, Chinatown. The loop full market parts of River North are included in there. And it shoots out west tours like Oak Park, Forest Park. And I will say one candidate. who is trying to activate that River North Fulton market group of voters is Jason Friedman from Freeman Properties. And I'd argue he is the more conservative of the Democratic candidates. And it's hoping that that name recognition makes him an optimal sleeper candidate. But again, there have been a lot of concerns about. where he's getting a lot of his money, whether it's from big real estate or A-PAC seems that he seems to be the chosen candidate of A-PAC as well. And so right now, I think the front runners are Lashon for and Melissa Conyers Irvin. Yeah, you know, as you say, bringing in that, it is like a weird little district, right? Because again, I really think of Danny. Again, I very much think of it as a south, southwest side. You know, I think of it going out into the west suburbs. Like, that's very much how I think of that district. And I always forget the loops in there. Museum campus. Yeah. Millennium Park. Yeah. The theater district. Some of the biggest commercial cores of the entire city. The medical district. Douglas Park, Garfield Park, all of downtown river access is in there as well. Some of the, yeah, some of the biggest commercial cores of the entire city of Chicago, which is, you know, I think is going to be really, really interesting for whoever is in this office, whoever, you know, it's going to be a new person. How do you balance those, those needs? in D.C. and in your district when you're here, right? Because, you know, your constituent needs in Fulton Market are miles away from your constituent needs in Austin, right? Like, those are completely different things. 100%. And again, you know, next to, you know, Robert Peters, I'd argue Danny Davis was the politician who when I was out in the streets, I saw the most. And it seems even coming into...

you know, recent elections, 2022, 2024, so much of his platform was still about, you know, being connected to the organizing community of the West Side to still be connected to Danny Davis, Danny Davis, to be connected to parts of the, to the parts of his district that were divested from, Englewood, Austin, and so forth. And so I agree with you. I wonder moving into 2026 beyond his age, the pressure from the federal government. But like you say, the changing concerns of the 7th Congressional District, the changing power, what Fulton Market looked like in 96 and what it looks like in 2026. Gee, I did the Google Street views recently and it blows your mind. how different they are from when he started to now. And so I'm very interested to see. Because again, we're also in a different political climate. We're talking about people who hail office for 25, 30 years. I don't know if that's the climate we live in now. So this person also has to make the case that they can win now. But for districts that are used to having a person be there for a while, they also have to make the case that they can be here for the long haul. All right. So we talked a nauseam about the biggest races we're watching these federal races from the Senate to Congress. But obviously there's a bunch of county races and state races on the ballot, including J.B. Pritzker, who I'd argue is about as safe a politician running a safer incumbent. He's running uncontested in the primary. But on the other side of things, there is a familiar face looking for a rematch. Yeah, Darren Bailey is running on the Republican side. So we're going to be watching that Republican primary a little bit to see if we end up with a rematch. People may remember. Darren Bailey ran against J.B. Pritzker in 2022 and lost in that general election. You know, he's a former downstate representative, you know, very, very conservative guy, right, Darren Bailey. And at the time that he was running in 2020, to the big issue was the safety act, right? That was the, it was all about public safety and the cash bail and the, what was going to happen? Well, now it's been in place for a couple years. I don't know, you know, if we end up with a rematch, which it's looking like we might, if polling is to be believed that, you know, he's leading in polls right now. But, yeah, it would be, it'll be curious to see how his campaign differs between now and 2022. In line with some other Illinois politicians, he does seem to be trying to distance himself from the Trump administration while at the same time completely supporting the actions of Border Patrol and ICE. Yeah, I mean, that's the thing about the Republican Party right now. And in Illinois in particular, the struggle of the GOP right now is, you know, you have so many, particularly suburban voters, because I think those suburban voters are the ones where you tend to see the most swing historically. And right now, even suburban Republicans.

aren't wild they don't like tariffs um you know even the polling on immigration and a lot of people think that trump is going too far uh even among conservatives and republicans um you know there is there's a lot not to like about the national gop party right now and a lot of suburban voters don't like it um and so i think in a statewide in a statewide race like that's the balance that any gop candidate has to has to strike and i'm not sure that it exists Some other races we are going to be watching. Cook County Board President Tony Preckwinkle has challengers, which, you know, I can't say she's had since she stopped running for the mayor's office a couple of years, a couple of terms ago. Yeah, I think the biggest one we've talked about, Alderman Brendan Riley, is making a go for Cook County Board President. And he is sort of positioning himself as one of these more conservative business-friendly Democrats, you know, someone who will be focused on, again, those business-friendly policies. Also, I think, cracking down on public safety, lowering taxes, right? Like, I think is going to be a big thing for him. And, you know, he represents in City Hall, he represents. you know, kind of the downtown core, uh, some of these, some of these downtown areas of Chicago. I, I can't say that I think prekwinkel is in a ton of trouble countywide. You know, she is one of the few, um, executives who has had like reasonable budget debates and is in fact still been able to, you know, fund stuff that happened during the pandemic and find ways to keep funding it has one of the most. progressive records for an executive in Illinois. And she just doesn't get a ton of bad press, you know? A lot of that is reserved for the mayor of Chicago or whoever. And so, you know, in that way, you kind of fly under the radars. She's also the county party chair, remember? And so, like, she holds a lot of sway over Democrats across the county and that democratic apparatus. We don't say machine anymore, right? Okay. And again, some bona fides. Cook County, the largest guarantee income pilot in our state when other parts of the state were trying it as well. A county that helps lead the nation and reforming cash bail. You talk about. making it easier and more accessible for people who are on Medicare to get relief. I think, again, she has a progressive record that she really can stand on at a time in which what it means to be a progressive is constantly being debated. Another name worth mentioning, Illinois Comptroller Susan Mendoza is retiring. There's five candidates running to replace her. The Comptroller is, you know, they... basically pay the state's bills. And, you know, you got several folks who are, you know, state representative, state senators, folks in the General Assembly and some other suburban, you know, office holders who are running for that seat. But the reason that it's worth mentioning that she...

is retiring is because she has been floated as a possible mayoral candidate in 2027 and sort of the, and she's kind of already campaigning for it. She's been on social and has been sort of trying to make a name for herself here in Chicago, which, you know, that, the fact that we're already talking about, I know it's only a year away because we have those elections in February. But still, the concept of 2027 doesn't exist to me yet. And so it's kind of wild to me that we are already in the speculation phase here. The current county assessor Fritz Keggi came in eight years ago as a progressive reformer because the office in a lot of people's eyes wasn't doing its base job. Well, there's a lot of reporting to support that. Yeah. Right. A lot of cronyism happening inside and a lot of political back scratching. Yeah. You know, a lot of political jobs being given out inside the assessor's office. And so even when Cook County Democrats had. through their endorsement behind an individual. Kegi was still able to win not being their endorsement eight years ago. Unfortunately, he hasn't necessarily gained and kept the confidence of county dams throughout that time. We've had some, I think really detailed conversations around property taxes, the role they play in funding our city, county, state government. But the feeling still remains that maybe the county assessor hasn't done enough during his tenure to essentially make sure that the burden of who is paying those property taxes is being equitably split. Well, I think he's getting it from both sides. Yeah, exactly. Residents are pissed. Businesses are pissed as well. As a reminder, the Assessor's Office is responsible for assessing property value and that those assessments then help to determine what your final property tax bill is. It's not the only thing, but it's kind of one of the major parts of that mathematical formula, right? And as you kind of allude to, Jacoby, we've had several years where people's residential property taxes have gone up a lot. We've talked about it in the South suburbs, talked about it in Pilsen, Logan Square, you know, on these assessment cycles. You know, but also. commercial businesses have been complaining that their property taxes are going up too much. And they say it's because of unfair assessing by Kegi and his office. And they kind of go, then go to the Board of Review. And the Board of Review is constantly like, yeah, we agree. You're been over-assessed. And, you know, the cycle. Border Review is where you go to appeal your property tax assessment. And right, here's the thing. I think here's when it comes down to it is like, right,

Nobody wants to be paying more in property taxes. Nobody wants to be paying more, period, on anything. But the people who are largely appealing it are your corporations, your wealthier. Yeah, commercial, commercial property owners largely. But, you know, Kagi kind of gets the, ends up the one who is blamed. And I think there are other questions about, you know, there's also this like, technology modernization thing that has kind of been between, you know. County was going to move their assessments and things digital and that has stalled time and time again. And of course, Kegis kind of had to eat that. And so, yeah, so I think he's getting it from both sides, both from residential property owners who feel overburdened and from commercial property owners who are like, oh my God, we just went through a pandemic. Like, why are you doing this to us? And so, yeah, it will kind of be interesting to see. which of those, you know, which of those things wins out, or if Keghi manages to overcome all that. And, you know, which. Yeah, because once again, he doesn't have the County Dems endorsement. They have given that to his challenger, Pat Jim Himes, who has also been endorsed by some union leaders. So, I mean, he's proven before he doesn't need their endorsement to win. But I don't know. I don't know. I feel like the conversation around. Like, at the time when he came in, there was a larger conversation about just the integrity of the assessor's office. And now the focus seems to be much more on the integrity of the assessments. And so I don't know if you- Of the system sort of writ large. Because, right, the property tax system is sort of this complicated dance between the assessor's office, the treasurer's office, and the board of review, right? And they, you know, how are these things working together? And again, Kegi has butted heads a lot with the Board of Review in particular, with the treasurer kind of sitting over there like, you two figure this out. We got computers to fix. Couple other things to look at over the next few weeks and months as you're preparing to go to the voters booth or drop off your mail-in ballot. Remind yourself what the Metropolitan Water Reclamation District of Greater Chicago does because there are some seats up for election. Familiarize yourself with your Cook County Circuit Court judge. Think about your state rep, your county board of review representative. But again, we will get into some more of these things as we get closer. I want to give a huge thank you to our executive. of producer Samoa Ali Seya. Hey, thanks, Jacoby. Of course, I can't close the door without some good news. You can catch me tonight at the Dan Theater and Roger Wicker Park hosting the moth. The theme is New Leaf slash First Timers. The doors open at six, show at seven. Check our show notes for a ticket link. And remember, if you want to get on stage and perform, all you got to do, show up early. Sign up to put your name in the hat, and maybe you're going to be one of the lucky 10 people I invite on stage to share about five or six minutes of your story. Also, this Friday, you can catch me on In the Loop with Sasha Ann Simons Live at 9am on WBEZ. As always, I appreciate y'all for listening and reading. We're going to be back bright and early tomorrow. We'll talk to you then. Peace.