Democrats Sweep Statewide Offices, Pick Up Two U.S. House Seats In Illinois
Nam Y. Huh/AP
On the 21st: The midterm election results are in: Democrats won the governorship, a supermajority in the General Assembly, and two Illinois seats in the U.S. House. We'll unpack last night's news with both reporters and voters alike.
What does it mean now that the Democrats have taken control of every statewide seat in Illinois? They also regained a supermajority in Springfield.
We also discuss how much the 'blue wave' swept across the Midwest: from Michigan to Wisconsin to Illinois, and even Kansas, Republican governors lost their seats.
Politico’s Natasha Korecki joined us on the line from Washington. We also spoke with Chicago Sun-Times columnist and ABC7 Political Analyst Laura Washington.
"I think a lot of people are seeing these results and scratching their heads," says @natashakorecki from @politico.
— The 21st (@21stShow) November 7, 2018
"Democrats are picking up the pieces and trying to figure out what worked and what didn't... certainly in the Midwest, Democrats made gains," she says.
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The story of the midterms is often about Congress, and that’s what everyone was talking about last night. As you’ve probably heard, it was a split result: Democrats took the House while Republicans expanded their Senate majority.
Here in Illinois, Democrats picked up two other House seats, but Republicans held on in southern and central Illinois. The 13th District - which covers a big part of central Illinois - was among the closest in the state. And at the time of broadcast, Democrat Betsy Dirksen Londrigan hadn’t conceded yet to incumbent Republican Rodney Davis. Brian Moline, managing editor for WILL joined us for more.
Republicans weren’t as fortunate in the Chicago suburbs. Last night, Illinois added two Democrats to our congressional delegation. Congressmen Peter Roskam and Randy Hultgren represent the 6th and 14th districts respectively, but they both lost to their Democratic challengers: Sean Casten and Lauren Underwood.
With those victories, Democrats will now have 13 out of our state’s 18 House seats. Jim Fuller is a senior writer with the Daily Herald. He’s been covering both of these races and he joined us from their newsroom for more anaylsis.
We also spoke with Ilinois Public Radio's Statehouse reporter Brian Mackey.
If you missed any other Congressional results from across the state, you can catch up on those right here: https://t.co/RWBECXpJ1G
— Brian Moline (@BMolineWILL) November 7, 2018
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We know voter turnout was high. The unofficial numbers from the state aren’t in yet but the State Board of Elections told us that voter registration was even higher than in 2016. In Champaign County unofficial numbers from the county clerk’s office showed that turnout was at 64%.
On the line to talk more about voting was Stephanie VanOrdstrand. Stephanie is a co-founder of the group Voices from the Prairie in Princeton, Ill. We also spoke with Carolyn Schafer who is a member of Voices from The Prairie.
"Our community has historically been Republican and Voices is trying to bridge the gap," says Carolyn Schafer from Voices of the Prairie in Princeton.
— The 21st (@21stShow) November 7, 2018
Voices (est. 2016) is focused on getting their community involved in local politics with a "trans-partisan" approach.