Assistant Public Defender Eulalia "Evie" De La Rosa, the Immediate Past President of the Puerto Rican Bar Association of Illinois, is the only candidate so far to file for the Ponce De Leon vacancy in the 6th Subcircuit. De La Rosa has been licensed as an attorney in Illinois since 2004.
Matthew Link was the only candidate filing for the Murphy vacancy in the 14th Subcircuit when the doors to the ISBE opened this morning. According to ARDC, Link is employed by the Committee on Finance of the City Council of the City of Chicago and has been licensed as an attorney in Illinois since 2004.
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E.P.
Does the Della Rosa race constitute the "friends and family plan" too?
Are you telling me Berrios did not know when Ponce was putting in his retirement papers and that Evie, by chance, did not circulate in the two other 6th sub vacancies?
It must be nice to know when those late vacancies will be coming. The party touts is success rate in getting judges elected, but it often does so by manipulating late vacancies and/or putting shills in races. Every cycle it is the same thing.
I'm sure it was just a coincidence too that the party withheld getting those Johnson vacancy petitions on the street, when miraculously the Palmer vacancy was announced weeks later allowing both party candidates' names to appear on a single petition. What luck!!
Hello Anonymous on December 14th at 3:13 PM,….. E.P. here.
It is no secret that Evie De La Rosa enjoys the support of the Democratic Committeemen of the 6th sub-circuit and that they helped her get on the ballot for the new vacancy at 8:00 AM on the very first day of filing. What will be interesting to see is who else jumps into this race. I have a few thoughts on this but will hold on to them until 5:00 PM on December 21st.
As for the “family and friends plan”, remember that that applies to supreme court appointments for the truly clouted. For that to have applied to Evie, the supremes had to hold back on announcing the Ponce de Leon vacancy until after the 1st of January, 2016. Then it would have been too late for the second round of petition gathering and only then could they have appointed Evie to the vacancy until the 2018 elections. But alas, the Puerto Ricans don’t have that kind of clout yet.
But I will tell you what is interesting. Unlike the 6th sub-circuit which has at least 2 other potential candidates circulating petitions, one Puerto Rican male and one Black female, the 14th sub-circuit is the real story of strange bed-fellows, clout, influence and complete ethnic undermining.
First a quick lesson in Hispanic neighborhoods in Chicago. The Puerto Ricans are concentrated on the north side of the city. The Mexicans are concentrated on the south side of the city. Therefore, Hispanics got 2 sub-circuits when those districts were created pursuant to the 1990 census. One for the Puerto Ricans on the north side (the 6th) and one for the Mexicans on the south side (the 14th).
The Puerto Rican 6th sub-circuit is 60% Hispanic. The Mexican 14th sub-circuit is 77% Hispanic. But unlike in the 6th sub-circuit where there is a least one Hispanic on the ballot, De La Rosa, and maybe one more, (if he can survive the all but certain challenge to his nominating papers) I can almost guarantee there will be no Mexican candidate on the ballot in the 14th sub-circuit.
In fact, I bet that the white guy that filed in the Ruble-Murphy vacancy (his name is Matthew Link and, surprise, he’s from Bridgeport) will be unopposed and will be next in a long line of white judges elected out of a sub-circuit that was given to the Mexicans on a silver platter. But that’s their fault. The Mexicans have been completely co-opted and silenced by the few Irish that are still around in those south side wards. So shame on the Mexicans.
But the 6th, oh the 6th, so close to my heart, that’s another story. We’re not playing that game. Nobody is co-opting us. Those are our wards. We own them. And we are not about to abdicate our responsibility. We are not going to let others dump their candidate on us. We are going to do exactly as the general assembly intended when they created those sub-circuits. We are going to make sure that we elect our own people. We insist on a judiciary that is representative of the people that they serve and the taxpayers that pay their salaries.
“We are the champions…
no time for losers…
‘cause we are the champions of the world.” As always…E. P.
E.P. -- I know some of the judges who've come out of 14's unique system and the ones I know personally are good people and have been good judges. But... now that you mention it... I'm actually a little surprised that, this time, the nod went where it did. This is not to say anything negative about Mr. Link, who I do not know... but I thought the stars and planets had lined up behind someone else in 14.
It just shows, yet again, how little I understand this process, even with the time I've spent trying to.
But thank you for your interesting, thoughtful comment.
Hello Mr. Leyhane.
E. P. here with a little addendum to my earlier comment on this post.
You wrote that you didn't know much about the candidate who is going to run unopposed in the 14th sub-circuit so I thought I'd fill in the blanks. So here's a little more information on Mr. Matthew Link.
He is a City of Chicago employee. He works for the City Council’s Finance Committee which is headed by none other than 14th Ward Ald. Ed Burke. So I have to revise my earlier statement that the “family and friends plan” is only a factor at the supreme court level. It is also in play at the sub-circuit level. So there. I fixed that.
As always, E. P.
C'mon, E.P., cut me some slack.... I included Mr. Link's employment in the original post and I don't have to explain who chairs the City Council Finance Committee to FWIW readers....
My point was that I thought someone else might be in line for this (likely) de facto appointment -- and my confession of ignorance related to my failure as a prognosticator. Of course, as I tell clients (and every one of them hates it when I say it), if I could predict the future, I'd buy a winning lottery ticket and retire.
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