Remember how I told you that everyone who won their primary race in March (with the exception of a handful of outliers in the far north and northwest suburban 12th and 13th Subcircuits) was pretty much guaranteed of election in November?
Well, as ESPN pundit Lee Corso might say, not so fast, my friend!
According to the Illinois State Board of Elections website, attorney Rhonda Sallee has filed as an independent candidate seeking the Williams vacancy in the 5th Subcircuit.
According to my archives, Sallee's is the first independent judicial bid filed in Cook County since 2010. Two candidates filed as independents for judicial office that year; neither made it to the November ballot.
The Election Code makes it difficult for judicial candidates to enter a party primary; there are large signature requirements and very particular rules about how those signatures are collected and arranged and what must be filed along with them. But these requirements, onerous as they may be, pale in comparison to those imposed on a would-be independent bid: The signature requirements are much, much greater than those required of a candidate seeking to file in an established party primary.
So Ms. Sallee's candidacy may falter without her ever making it to the ballot.
If she overcomes any objections to her petitions, however, Sallee's November opponent would be Daryl Jones. Jones won the Democratic race for the Williams vacancy in the March primary.
Sallee has been an attorney in Illinois since 1999. According to the ARDC, Sallee maintains a law office in the Chicago Temple Building across the street from the Daley Center. Sallee's LinkedIn page notes that she has also served as a hearing officer for the ARDC, as an arbitrator in the Cook County Mandatory Court-Annexed Arbitration System, and as administrative law judge (though the LinkedIn page does not specify the agency for which she works, or has worked). Sallee was a countywide judicial candidate in 2012.
4 weeks ago
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3 comments:
I applaud her for trying. Most voters will just vote straight Dem in that subcircuit, but it's worth seeing if being a female against a male is so big an advantage that an independent can beat a Democrat. My guess is no, but hey, stranger things have happened
There were two contested judicial elections in that subcircuit in the primary, both had a male against a female. Both males won and both females lost. Being a female can't be so big of an advantage. Most people will just vote straight Democrat in that subcircuit.
In 2007 I did an analysis of voting in contests for circuit court judgeships, and found that roughly 90 percent of the vote was determined by party label--not gender, ethnicity, bar/newspaper ratings or anything else. It's a huge challenge for an independent candidate.
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