Full Illinois Congressional Primary Results

In Illinois, the slew of statewide congressional primaries played the undercard to the presidential campaign, but there were some compelling primary matchups in the Land of Lincoln on Tuesday. Here’s a recap:

IL 03: Rep. Daniel Lipinski (D) easily fended off a well-funded challenge from attorney Mark Pera by a 53 to 26 percent margin. Two lesser-known Democratic candidates split the remainder of the vote.

Pera was a favored candidate of progressive online activists, but the money spent on his behalf proved to be no match for the Lipinski ground game in this South Side Chicago-based district.

IL 14: Two multimillionaire candidates are set to square off in a special election next month to succeed former House Speaker Dennis Hastert, but Democrats have got to be concerned about the narrow victory margin of their nominee, scientist Bill Foster.

Despite spending over $1 million for the compressed primary schedule — nearly 10 times more than his leading primary opponent, John Laesch — Foster only led Laesch by a 43 to 41 percent margin with still some precincts left to count. The AP still hasn’t called the race, but an Illinois Democratic source believes that Foster will pull off the victory with a razor-thin margin.

There was a separate ballot for the special election next month, and Foster defeated Laesch for that nomination a bit more comfortably — by about 3,000 votes.

Dairy owner Jim Oberweis, who spent nearly $2 million in a highly-negative primary, defeated Chris Lauzen by a 56 to 42 percent margin. Oberweis received a key boost when he received Hastert’s endorsement last December.
Continue reading post...