Mayor Eric Gregg of downstate Harrisburg, Ill. said he will move quickly to appeal the Federal Emergency Management Authority decision not to provide federal disaster relief to the town and other parts of Southern Illinois hit hard by severe tornadoes last month. more ›

Senator Mark Kirk, who suffered a stroke last weekend, has been improving after surgery this week. more ›

The 52-year-old junior senator complained to his doctor over the weekend of odd feelings in his left leg, numbness in his left arm and seeing white flecks. more ›

Senators Dick Durbin and Mark Kirk both made statements typical of party line politicians. more ›

Metra wants to hike fares by about 27 percent, and U.S. senators Durbin and Kirk want an explanation. more ›

A man broke into Senator Mark Kirk's office in the Kluczynski Federal Building downtown on Friday and threatened to jump off from the 35th floor. more ›

The Federal Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services put the brakes on new Medicaid requirements Illinois put in place in the hopes of preventing fraud. more ›

With gas prices above $4 a gallon in Illinois, one of the highest prices per gallon in the nation, pump prices are becoming a political talking point. Sen. Mark Kirk proposed a few ideas Monday that quickly granting offshore drilling permits, permanent renewable energy credits and loosening federal regulation would lower prices. He also suggested the conflict in Libya played a role. more ›

In the wake of the tragedy in Japan, Senators Dick Durbin (D-IL) and Mark Kirk (R-IL) will host a bi-partisan hearing in Chicago tomorrow on safety in Illinois nuclear power plants and disaster preparedness at the Dirksen Federal Building. Illinois generates more nuclear power than any other state. Governor Pat Quinn told WGIL that he wants the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to “take a closer look” at the plants, all operated by Exelon. more ›

A handful of Illinois Republican legislators sent a letter to President Obama yesterday, once again demanding that the Administration “abandon any and all efforts” to house detainees from Guantanamo Bay at the empty prison in Thomson. The Journal Dispatch reports Mark Kirk, Aaron Schock and 6 others sent the letter, which asks the President for a “firm commitment...so that Congress can focus its efforts on acquiring and operating Thomson as a maximum-security federal prison.” more ›

House Republicans are targeting $6.8 billion in transportation spending cuts across the country. Among the programs facing a removal in funding is $133 million allocated to build a bridge at 63rd and State which would allow Metra trains to pass over the Norfolk Southern tracks that also serve Amtrak lines. Dubbed the "Englewood Flyover," the project, when completed, would reduce a bottleneck affecting 80 Metra Rock Island Line trains and 60 Amtrak and freight trains a day. more ›

Apparently the recent separation of Al and Tipper Gore was what led Senator Mark Kirk to oppose climate change legislation, and not political or economic considerations. Kirk told the New York Times that his rationale for not supporting climate change legislation in Illinois is the result of Al Gores' personal life, not as a result of political or economic factors. "The consensus behind the climate change bill collapsed and then further deteriorated with the personal and political collapse of Vice President [Al] Gore," Kirk said in what was described as a "brief interview." more ›

U.S. Senator Mark Kirk has joined the Republican call to let states like Illinois go bankrupt to help restructure their debt and right their financial ships (so much for the GOP being the champions of state sovereignty). more ›

If Pat Quinn campaigned through the primary and general election with the urgency and tenacity he displayed in the gubernatorial campaign’s final weeks, he might have beaten Bill Brady by a wider margin than he did. The Senate campaign, meanwhile, was distilled to one issue: who did voters trust more? Did they trust the congressman who embellished his military record? Or the Golden Boy who oversaw a bank that failed and may have made loans to alleged mobsters? Ultimately, voters chose the former. more ›

Mark Kirk may have done the right thing and voted to repeal DADT over the weekend, but not without a price tag. more ›

The Senate made history yesterday and, frankly, did the right thing yesterday, voting to end the "don't ask, don't tell" ban on gays and lesbians in the military. The vote stands as a landmark in gay rights and helps President Obama fulfill a campaign promise. more ›

Last week phone lines to congressional offices were burning up, as activists on both sides of the political divide were calling their senators and representatives, urging them to vote for or against an extension of the Bush era tax cuts, the Don't Ask Don't Tell repeal, the DREAM Act and an extension of unemployment benefits for out of work Americans. Among the senators who were frequently listed in emails blasts and Facebook posts as needing to hear from constituents was newly-minted Illinois Senator Mark Kirk. Unfortunately, some Illinoisans had trouble reaching Kirk's staff. more ›

Mark Kirk talked big during his swearing in about taking a bipartisan, centrist approach to being Illinois' junior senator. Given an opportunity to walk the walk yesterday, voting with Senate Republicans to filibuster a procedural motion to consider next year's defense authorization bill and, by extension, bring the repeal of the military's "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy to a vote. This despite support for the repeal from 78 percent of Americans, a majority of military members and the recommendation of Defense Secretary Robert Gates. more ›

Mark Kirk was sworn in as Illinois' junior senator yesterday, calling his swearing in the end to "a sad chapter in Illinois history" and pledging a bipartisan, centrist approach while taking a shot at Democrats he said had squandered the public's goodwill. "Our state's leaders tried to sell this seat, then blocked an election to fill it," Kirk said at a reception following his swearing in. "But the courts, the law and the people spoke." more ›

According to an AP report, Kirk won’t be seated in time for the start of the lame duck session of Congress because the paperwork officially declaring him senator won’t be delivered until November 29th. Already, a website has been created to “save us” from the lame duck session and various media outlets have penned scathing editorials. more ›

While folks in Southern Illinois are busy blaming Chicago for Bill Brady's defeat in he race for Governor, ballot experts have narrowed the focus to "ticket splitters," those folks who don't always vote straight party. 2 percent of Illinois voters chose Pat Quinn for Governor and Mark Kirk for Senator on election night. more ›

In a show of collegiality strikingly missing in this election cycle, Senator-elect Mark Kirk and defeated Democratic candidate Alexi Giannoulias met at the Billy Goat Tavern last night for a beer. “Alexi and I, during this campaign, we discussed having a beer when this is all over,” Kirk told CBS2. “The first round is on me.” more ›

Capitalizing on voter concerns of the economy and the spark provided by the Tea Party movement, the Republican Party staged what Illinois Senator-elect Mark Kirk called "a tsunami in the heartland," taking control of the House of Representatives and gaining enough seats in the Senate to make life miserable for Majority Leader Harry Reid and the Democratic majority there. "The American people's voice was heard at the ballot box," said the incoming House Speaker, Ohio's John Boehner. more ›

Well, here we are. The polls have closed and it's all over but the waiting. We've installed a twitter chat widget in the post so you can follow along on the updates throughout the evening. You can also join in on the conversation by using the hashtag #Chilection2K10.

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The polls will close in five hours across Illinois and it's nice to not have to hear or see a campaign commercial. This must be the silence Mom referred to as her time, before we all stirred awake and she herded us along to school. more ›

With days to go before the general election, major television stations are pulling Bill Brady's campaign commercials because he hasn't paid for the airtime. And here we thought the ads last night seemed slightly less offensive because the politicians wised up on negative ads. more ›

This election season has been one of the most expensive in history in Illinois, in nearly every race for office. Last week, Fox News Chicago estimated that candidates in the Chicago area spent at least $61.1 million on television campaign advertisements alone. The Illinois Campaign for Political Reform reported that ten legislative races hit $1 million in campaign spending, with more than 60% of funds coming from legislative leaders. Even holding onto a Supreme Court seat shattered spending records. The ICPR reported this week $3.1 million dollars raised in the one-candidate retention contest of Justice Thomas Kilbride. more ›

Thanks to the magic of pop-up ads, Chicagoist discovered Wal-Mart's foray into electoral politics this morning. Walmart Community Votes "is dedicated to providing you with the resources, tools, and information to help you make that decision - in a non-partisan and objective format," by connecting users with information on where and how to vote, as well as links to who the elected officials in a given area are, and who the candidates in a given race are. The site isn't very profound as far as content goes - they've only offered printed responses to a questionnaire sent to the two major-party candidates in Illinois. What's more, it appears that only Mark Kirk filled out the questionnaire. more ›

Yesterday, we talked about the tenuous relationship that mainstream Republican candidates have with Tea Party activists. To wit: GOP gubernatorial candidate Bill Brady will be attending a Tea Party event in Will County, but isn't promoting it as such. Now Mark Kirk will be joining Massachusetts Senator Scott Brown (along with Bill Brady) on Halloween at Joe's Bar on Weed Street. more ›

We’re now heading into the home stretch in election season and both the gubernatorial and senate elections are tight races, according to polls released by the Tribune. Republicans Mark Kirk and Bill Brady both lead their respective races, but by thin margins. Kirk holds a 3 percent lead over Giannoulias (44% to 41%) while Brady has a 4 point lead over Quinn (43% to 39%). more ›