The Illinois Senate primary is tonight. Polls close at 7 p.m. central time (8 p.m. eastern, 5 p.m. pacific). There are a lot of races taking place but, as a D.C. focused blogger, I will only be providing updates on the Democratic primary for U.S. Senate. Check out Swing State Project and Archpundit for the nitty gritty on the other campaigns.
Vote margin: Giannoulias +34,822 (going up--this is over. No further updates.)
Update (9:12 eastern)--Looking like Giannoulias: Smart observation from alex in the comments:
it's hard to see a path for victory for Hoffman. He's not doing well enough in the collar counties to offset Chicago city and he's doing mostly poorly outside of Chicagoland at the moment.
Hoffman isn't strong enough in the city of Chicago to stage a comeback there. His weakness among African-Americans, and downstate, appears ready to sink him.
Very worried about Giannoulias making himself, and the party, look bad with his banking ties. He may be the more lefty than Hoffman, but I can't say I was pulling for him tonight. Ties to a banking scandal are just terrible right now.
Update 2--A look at the Illinois 10th. Worth noting, from minvis in the comments:
But the House 10th District is shaping up to be a good chance at a pickup for the Democrats. This is Kirk's old House seat. The moderate Republican, Elizabeth Coulson, is losing substantially to a more conservative Republican. This is a slightly Democratic leaning district nationally. It voted for Gore, Kerry and Obama the last 3 presidential elections. Whoever wins the Democratic race, Seals is leading slightly right now, will more closely align with the electorate there than a right-wing Republican.
Good note. Too add, IL-10 actually isn't slightly lean Democratic--it is D+6 in Cook PVI, which makes it roughly 12 points more favorable to Democrats than the national picture. It is the second most Democratic district in the country held by a Republican (Delaware at-large is #1 in this category).
Follow the results of the House race here. I am a little dubious about Seals--pretty sure he isn't particularly progressive. This is also his third run, and he failed to take the seat during two very Democratic years. On the other hand, I know nothing about Julie Hamos, his main opponent.
With 4 precincts left to report, Seals leads by 662 votes. Looks like Seals eeked it out.
update 3--Hamos appears to be Jan Schakowsky protege. Multiple commenters are now reporting that Hamos is a protege of Jan Schakowsky. That sounds pretty good to me.
If Hamos is great, and if she doesn't pull this out, it feels like a lost opportunity for a progressive pickup. Terrible mistake on my part--should have done my research and gotten involved.
Update 4--Mark Kirk crushes tea party challengers in Republican Senate primary: To no one's surprise, Mark Kirk cruises to victory in the Republican Senate primary. He currently has 56% of the vote, and only 19% for the closest challenger.
Update 5--I am calling it for Giannoulias: Giannoulias is going to be the Democratic nominee for Senate in Illinois. Hopefully, his scandals will stay local, and he will find a way to beat Kirk despite them. He leads in the polls right now, but keep an eye on this campaign. Could get very dicey.
No further updates tonight. This is an open thread on the Illinois primary.
Broadway Bank, the troubled Chicago lender owned by the family of Illinois Treasurer and U.S. Senate candidate Alexi Giannoulias, has entered into a consent order with banking regulators requiring it to raise tens of millions in capital, stop paying dividends to the family without regulatory approval, and hire an outside party to evaluate the bank's senior management.
The Jan. 26 consent order with the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. and the Illinois Division of Banking comes less than a week before Mr. Giannoulias - Broadway's chief lender and then vice-president from 2002 to 2006 - must face voters in the Democratic primary for the Senate seat previously held by President Barack Obama.
The story broke on January 26th, the day after both PPP and Rasmussen completed their polls on the campaign. As such, any polls showing Giannoulias performing better in the general election than his two main rivals, David Hoffman and Cheryle Jackson, are now out of date.
Being caught in a banking scandal is always bad. Being caught in one during this political environment is practically a death sentence to a campaign. If Giannoulias were to win the primary, Democrats would be extremely hard pressed to keep the seat in November. Even worse, having a prominent Senate candidate--the Democratic nominee for President Obama's old seat--personally involved in a banking scandal like this could hurt Democratic chances in many other elections, too.
So, is there any chance Illinois Democrats will make the right move, and nominate either Jackson or Hoffman? Actually, the odds seem pretty good, especially for Hoffman. Here are all public polls on the campaign since early December:
Since December, Giannoulias has effectively picked up no undecided voters. At the same time, Jackson has gained 3%, while Hoffman has surged 11%.
Even before the banking scandal hit, Giannoulias was not picking up any new support. Now, with Hoffman (and, to a such lesser extent, Jackson) apparently surging, and with the banking scandal in play, it is hard to see how Giannoulias picks up any of the remaining undecided support. With 25% of the electorate still undecided, this should be enough for Hoffman to win.
Hopefully, the banking scandal will boost the current pro-Hoffman trend. If Jackson wins, that's fine too. The worry is if Illinois Democrats either ignore this scandal, or give Giannoulias a sympathy vote for being targeted (that has happened in another big Dem machine town, Philadelphia, before). If they do, this Senate seat is probably GOP. Many others will become easier GOP pickups, too.
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