· Evans finally withdraws.

U.S. Rep. Lane Evans, D-Ill., submitted his official withdrawal from the November general election ballot in a letter sent Monday to the Illinois State Board of Elections.

When the letter is received in Springfield today, it will pave the way for Democrats in the 17th District to finalize the race for a replacement candidate.

Don Johnston, the 17th District state central committeeman, said a nomination meeting will be held in Galesburg about one week after Evans’ official withdrawal. That meeting will be exclusively for the purpose of nominating and seconding candidates, with the actual voting by precinct committeemen done through a mail ballot sent out shortly after the meeting. […]

Although a judge, citing Evans’ health problems, appointed his brothers as temporary guardians with the power to make decisions on financial and medical matters, the congressman did sign the withdrawal of candidacy form himself, his aides said.

· Meanwhile, a former Evans aide has endorsed Sen. John Sullivan for the spot.

Jeremiah Posedel, who also was the downstate director for U.S. Sen. Barack Obama’s 2004 campaign, said Sullivan would best represent the 17th Congressional District, which includes all or parts of 23 counties.

“I’ve been to every single county in that district. I just thought John Sullivan was the best fit,” he said Monday. Posedel said that Sullivan, like Evans and Obama, is “above a lot of the political fray.”

Posedel, 27, was Evans’ political director from 2001-04, and is now a law student at the University of Illinois at Champaign. He sent an e-mail over the weekend making the endorsement. The Sullivan campaign is expected to announce it later this week, he said.

· John Sullivan is profiled here and here.

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