2024 judicial campaigns already getting underway....

Gad, what a depressing thought, right? The results of the April election will not even be official until next week (April 25, to be precise) and, yet, 2024 judicial campaign websites are already being launched.

But, however unsettling it may be for the rest of us, serious judicial candidates pretty much have to be setting their campaigns in motion already. The primary is only 11 months hence, even though the winners of those primary races (assuming, as has been the case in nearly all Cook County races in recent years, that those primary winners will not be troubled by opposition on the November ballot) will have to wait another 8½ months thereafter before being sworn into office.

The forthcoming election cycle will feature the first test of Cook County's new 20-subcircuit map.

The Cook County Clerk will issue maps of each subcircuit soon -- probably in June, according to the best information that FWIW has been able to determine -- but that doesn't mean that the boundaries of the redrawn subcircuits are not yet known. They are known, and have been known, since January 2022. This map, an interactive version of which is presently available via the Cook County Clerk's website, shows the boundary lines:

Persons interested in seeking a seat in a new subcircuit will want to consult this map, but should actually study 705 ILCS 24/5, Section 5 of the Judicial Circuits Districting Act of 2022. These seemingly endless chains of apparently random numbers may seem impenetrable to the general reader, but, trust me, they have been carefully digested and analyzed by many prospective judicial candidates and the political gurus who will support their campaigns.

FWIW will have the official Subcircuit maps when they come out.

But this will be mostly for the edification of potential voters. Prosepctive candidates who are waiting for the maps to launch their campaigns may never get off the ground.

Of course, being first to declare is no guarantee of victory -- but an early start may help someone stand out (and build vital name recognition) in a crowded field.

With that in mind, the first 2024 Cook County judicial campaign website that has been called to my attention (so far) is Liam Kelly's. That's a link to the website in the preceding sentence; there's also a campaign Facebook page. Eventually, this site will be included on FWIW's Sidebar, which will show a list of all Cook County judicial campaign websites. (Just not for a while, yet, please.) Kelly was a candidate for a 10th Subcircuit vacancy in the 2020 election cycle. He has been licensed to practice law in Illinois since 2011, according to ARDC, which also notes that Kelly presently works for the Law Offices of Robert Louis Rascia, Ltd.

I will post other Cook County judicial campaign websites as I stumble across them or they are called to my attention.

It isn't just Cook County that has to contend with new subcircuits this year. Readers may recall the post I put up in January concerning the appointment of Jennifer Barron (with whom I used to work) to a DuPage County vacancy. Judge Barron now has a campaign website, too (yes, that's a link). Although she was appointed to an at-large vacancy (the link here is to the Supreme Court's appointment order), the new website makes clear that Barron will be seeking election to a vacancy in DuPage County's new Second Judicial Subcircuit. I don't pretend to know why this is so; the process of allocating existing vacancies in the new suburban subcircuits is no doubt different from the process being followed in our own County Cook.