A three-judge federal court panel tossed a lawsuit filed by Illinois GOP leaders that claims the redrawn state legislative maps by their Democratic counterparts was unfair to minority groups and Republican voters. more ›

The new boundaries would make Walsh's 8th district more Democratic, and the Tea Party darling must be predicting his chances of reelection would be much slimmer. more ›

Despite a federal lawsuit filed by 10 Republican congressmen, a judge ruled that U.S. House candidates can start circulating ballot petitions after Labor Day. more ›

Former Representative Bill Foster announced this morning that he was back in the political hunt, this time for the 11th District which now covers Aurora. more ›

During every Presidential race, the ridiculously important topic of "Who gets to choose Supreme Court Justices" plays a ridiculously minor part in the voters' decision making process. Similarly, in the most recent statewide elections, the topic that could be the decade's most important political decision is one that got equally little discussion during the last election cycle: redistricting. Map-making. Redrawing. "Gerrymandering." more ›

Even as Chicagoans prepare to hit the polls Tuesday, an issue left over from last November's election looms large for many Illinois politicos. Redistricting: that time-honored process of gerrymandering political district borders for the state Legislature and U.S. House of Representatives that has been elevated to an ugly art form across the Land of Lincoln. One of the few comforts emerging for Democrats as the dust clears from their national whooping in the last election, the party retained control of the General Assembly in Springfield; which translates into control of the redistricting process. This is one of only seven states where the Dems will be drawling the lines, but the once-in-a-decade process should be particularly interesting here given the City and statewide population declines and the power realignment that will likely occur in response to the alarming African-American flight from Chicago. more ›

After some good old-fashioned community organizing, leaders in Chinatown have a political victory under their belt: the state legislature sent Governor Quinn a bill that once signed, will consolidate the 59 precincts in Chicago's Chinatown into one legislative district. more ›

The Census Bureau is set to announce its population counts today which, by all accounts, doesn't bode well for Illinois' Congressional delegation and the seats the GOP picked up in the November elections. more ›

Multiple plans to change the way districts in the state are re-drawn have fallen short of getting on the November ballot. more ›

The state constitution requires that "in the year following each Federal decennial census year, the General Assembly by law shall redistrict the Legislative Districts and the Representative Districts." This means that legislative districts in Illinois will be due to be redrawn in 2011 after this year's census. This year, a movement to change the way Illinois draws legislative districts is under way. Currently, redistricting is controlled by the General Assembly in a convoluted process governed by party leaders downstate that involves the drawing of names from a hat. The result of this process, which happens away from public input and scrutiny, is that legislators have the opportunity to draw their own districts, keeping their seats safe, and their incumbency protected. more ›

The state is due to explore it's once-every-10-years redistricting plan in 2011 once the census is delivered. Exactly how does the state go about redrawing those boundaries? It's a pretty crazy process, which doesn't surprise us at all. According to WBEZ: more ›