* Politico interviews Abdelnasser Rashid, a progressive who defeated Rep. Mike Zalewski (D-Riverside) in the primary…
Along with knocking out a powerful lawmaker, Rashid’s victory is significant because of how he won: using his full name and showcasing his ethnicity, including his wife in full hijab.
The 32-year-old Chicago-born community organizer had run unsuccessfully in previous races — for Cook County Commission in 2018 and Cook County Board of Review in 2020. In both those races, he was advised to Americanize his name to “Nas,” a nickname he sometimes uses, and to downplay his background. The thinking was that he needed to be palatable to voters who might have prejudices against Arabs or perceived foreigners.
Rashid ignored the advice then and set out on his latest campaign with optimism that voters would accept him for who he is.
“We believed that once people got to know me, that they can move past any preconceptions,” Rashid told Playbook.
Like other successful candidates, he spent countless hours walking the district, “personally knocking on close to 7,000 doors,” he said. “There’s nothing more powerful than real conversations — not just to share your vision but to hear what’s going on in their lives.”
Political observers see Rashid’s success in the 21st District, which includes Cicero and Berwyn, and Delia Ramirez’s victory in the newly created 3rd Congressional District, as proof that the suburbs are becoming more diverse.
Yes, they’re becoming more diverse, but also much more welcoming, at least in the Democratic primary.
* Allie Lichterman with the People’s Lobby, which put a ton of progressive volunteers into the field this spring, has a Sun-Times op-ed…
Heading into the midterm elections, media outlets and political party leaders insisted that “tough-on-crime” policies would be on every voter’s mind; if elected officials wanted to win, they must back off reforms or face losses and the wrath of police unions.
In Cook County, primary election results told a very different story. Progressives who talked about non-carceral solutions to violence won big.
Movement-grown state Rep. Delia Ramirez beat a powerful sitting alderman in her bid for Congress. Toni Preckwinkle held onto her role as Cook County board president while supporting jail decarceration and bail reform. Organizer Anthony Quezada defeated a long- time incumbent for Cook County commissioner on a platform that included a civilian first responder program.
Meanwhile, the Fraternal Order of Police failed to convince the public that reforming the criminal legal system will undermine public safety. The clearest test was on Chicago’s Northwest Side, home to many police officers and assumed to be conservative. […]
While the FOP poured $100,000 into trying to scare voters, concerned community members with the People’s Lobby had actual conversations with people in those same neighborhoods. We knocked on the doors of over 8,000 people and spoke directly with thousands of them. What we heard may surprise the FOP and the pundits.
We brought up ending money bond at every door, and voters understood that denying people the presumption of innocence does not keep us safe. What does is school funding, racial justice, health care, bike lanes, reforming our regressive tax system, and much more.
It’s not like any of these candidates sent out mailers promising to let more people out of prison. But they didn’t run away from the issues and talked about other things that society can do to address crime. And all the winners worked hard and fielded strong campaigns.
Also, Delia Ramirez won DuPage County 67-20 over Gil Villegas.
* Trying to ham-handedly gin up fear among the primary electorate failed miserably. WTTW…
[Rep. Delia Ramirez] actually won two races on Jan. 28. She was also elected as the Democratic State Central Committeeperson, defeating Iris Martinez, the Cook County Circuit Court Clerk. Martinez campaigned with Catanzara, and endorsed many of the same candidates backed by the police union. Ramirez will now have a say in how the Democratic Party of Illinois operates. […]
Ald. Rossana Rodriguez Sanchez (33rd Ward) said it was a miscalculation on the part of Democratic moderates like Martinez to respond to the spike in violence during the pandemic by supporting so-called “tough on crime” measures and seeking the support of Chicago’s police union.
“It didn’t resonate,” said Rodriguez Sanchez, who has advocated for legislation decreasing funding for the Chicago Police Department and increasing funding for mental health treatment and social services. “It was a landslide.”
The Chicago FOP-funded mailers were over the top and not very well produced. But they and others will be back in the fall against folks like Sen. Rob Martwick (D-Chicago). They probably won’t do much better. Martwick, a former FOP ally, represents a district that all statewide Democrats have won by double digits the past three cycles. The “closest” race was Comptroller Susana Mendoza’s first win in 2016, and that margin in Martwick’s new district was still about 12 points (she won by 4.6 in Martwick’s current district). She then took the district by 38 points two years later.
*** UPDATE *** Not exactly a fabulous ROI…