Illinois congressional candidates weigh in on voters' top issues in the 2026 midterm election
Voters say their top issues going into the 2026 midterm election are immigration, President Trump's policies, and affordability.
Meanwhile, a large number of long-term Illinois congressional members are exiting after their terms this year. Ther are race sin the House of Representatives to replace Danny Davis, Jan Schakowski, Robin Kelly and more. In the Senate, Dick Durbin will retire after 30 years representing the state.
On CBS News Chicago's new political show The Angle, we asked the opponents to weigh on what matters most to voters when they head to the polls in just over two months.
Democrat Daniel Biss and Republican John Elleson are both running to fill Rep. Jan Schakowsky's House seat for Illinois' 9th District, which includes parts of Chicago's North Side, north suburbs and northwest suburbs.
They talk about immigration in very different ways.
"In a moment that Donald Trump and the Republicans are weaponizing Ice and CBP to attack our communities, abduct our neighbors, terrorize people," Biss, who is currently mayor of Evanston, said. "And so they want someone who's going to go not only fight for comprehensive immigration reform, but fight back against these grotesque and outrageous and illegal violent excesses."
"We have illegals in our church every Sunday and they'll never come in," said Elleson, who is a pastor. "We'll never allow police to come into our church. But government is different and government has a job to do and their job is to enforce laws."
On the South Side, Robin Kelly is exiting Congress too. Democrat Donna Miller, a Cook County Commissioner, and Republican Mike Noack, a Kankakee County truck driver, are on the ballot to replace her in Illinois' 2nd congressional district. We asked them about affordability.
"The executives, if they just give back a couple of million dollars of their multimillion-dollar bonuses to the people that actually make the money, they might have people actually showing up to work and be happy about it," Noack said.
We pointed out that sounds like the Democratic platform, asking corporate America to give back.
"Yeah, well, that's the thing is that I'm out here for the people, not corporate," Noack said with a laugh.
"People care about not being able to afford health care. I've heard that across the board, people have said that their premiums have gone up, and for a small business that is makes it very unaffordable," Miller told us.
But what could she do in Congress to help move things along?
"Well, one of the first things is to put the Affordable Care act back on in place," she said. "All of the cuts, the $880 billion worth of cuts that this administration put forth are affecting everyday people. We have to put those back."
More from these candidates and insiders' analysis of the delicate walk Mayor Brandon Johnson has to navigate this budget season as he runs for a second term will be on The Angle this Sunday morning.
