Results tagged “republican”

With how nasty the race for Dennis Hastert's vacant seat has gotten recently, you'd think a couple of high school girls were running the campaigns leading up to tomorrow's special election for Dennis Hastert's seat in Illinois 14th Congressional District.

Yesterday's primaries in Ohio, Texas, Vermont and Rhode Island saw John McCain assume the mantle of the Republican presidential nominee, with commanding victories in all but Texas, and Mike Huckabee's announcement that he's withdrawing from the race. "It's now important that we turn our attention not to what could have been or what we wanted to have been, but now what must be -- and that is a united party," Huckabee told told supporters in Dallas. After it became clear that McCain would sweep all four races, Barack Obama called McCain to congratulate him on winning the nomination, adding that he was looking forward to facing the Arizona senator in the general election.

With the special election for Dennis Hastert's vacant 14th Congessional District seat coming up next Saturday, the race has heated up. Democrat Bill Foster has hit Jim Oberweis almost daily, pointing out the differences on Social Security, global trade, and the war in Iraq. Oberweis has fought back, calling Foster a liberal and a liar, and charging that he will raise taxes. The close race got even more interesting this week when Foster released recent internal polling indicating that he leads Oberweis in the race. Now Foster is claiming that Oberweis violated the so-called "Millinoare's Law", by failing to disclose that he was about to dump buckets of his own cash into the race.

The Cook County Board of Commissioners had a contentious meeting yesterday as they tried to resolve a looming budget shortfall of nearly $300 million. The board must pass a budget by Feb 29 or face a partial shut down of the county government.

Tony Rezko's rise to power in state politics didn't happen overnight. When got started as a strong advocate of grassroots Arab-American activism in Chicago and was often the largest contributor to Arab-American campaigns. But several years ago, Rezko’s name started showing up on campaign disclosure forms for prominent politicians in Chicago, Cook County and the state.

In a race that may be a precursor to the Ohio and Texas Democratic primaries in March, Barack Obama won a decisive victory in Wisconsin last night, leading Hillary Clinton by nearly 20 points. He also won Hawaii, taking over 75 percent of the vote in a state where he had campaigned as a "native son." His victories last night mark his ninth and tenth consecutive primary or caucus wins and put his pledged delegate count at 1,140. Clinton has 1,005 pledged delegates. When you add in committed superdelegates, Obama leads Clinton 1,301 to 1,239, with John Edwards's 26 delegates still in play. Chris Bowers at OpenLeft points out that Clinton has now surpassed Jessee Jackson's 1988 total of 1218 delegates. 1988 saw the highest number of delegates ever won by a Democrat who did not win the nomination.

John McCain, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, will visit Illinois next Wednesday, appearing at a fundraiser at the Rich Harvest Farms golf course in Sugar Grove to raise money for 14th District Congressional candidate Jim Oberweis. Oberweis's campaign spokesman Bill Pascoe said the appearance will give Oberweis a boost with independents as well as an infusion of cash heading into the the March 8 special election to choose a successor to former House Speaker Dennis Hastert. "Republicans are united and energized about holding this seat," Pascoe told the Tribune.

Barack Obama swept the Potomac Primary last night, bringing his winning streak to eight, and eclipsing Hillary Clinton in the delegate count, 1,059 to 956 among pledged delegates.

We're celebrating by making you a list of things that are awesome.

Obama's landslide victories in the "Significant Saturday" contests - including Louisiana, Nebraska, Washington and the Virgin Islands, and his Sunday win in the Maine caucuses, could break the deadlock over pledged delegates for the Democratic nomination. Obama is hoping that these wins will generate the momentum that he needs to carry Ohio and Texas on March 4. Rhode Island and Vermont hold their primaries that day, too. Obama's wins this weekend were bad news for Hillary Clinton, who tried to inject a ray of optimism by announcing that her campaign had raised $10 million from over 10,000 donors. Obama's campaign quickly announced that over 350,000 donors had already contributed this year.

It wasn't just Presidential candidates that were running for nominations in yesterday's vote. A handful of local Democrats and Republicans also ran for their party's spot on the November ballot as well.

John McCain won big in last night's Republican primaries, winning nine states and pushing his delegate count up to 559--not enough to win the nomination, but big enough to secure his standing as the front runner. Mike Huckabee got a boost last night as well, winning a string of upsets in the Southern states, enough to justify his continued candidacy. Mitt Romney, however, has bigger problems, winning only a handful of states, and with Huckabee still in, he won't get the one-on-one race he so desperately wanted.

As election results continue to roll in, at least one race is still neck and neck: The democratic race in the Illinois 14th. Perennial candidate Jim Oberweis nabbed the Republican slot, but Bill Foster and John Laesch were, at last count, separated by a scant 351 votes. (Foster: 32,189, Laesch: 31,838) A Laesch campaign staffer told us that within the next 48 hours, they're hoping to finish canvassing the county, making sure all the early votes and absentee ballots were counted. Whoever wins will face Oberweis for Dennis Hastert's old seat.

Today's the big day. Along with 24 other states, we're voting in Super Duper Tuesday. Up for grabs are 1688 pledged Democratic delegates, and 900 Republican delegates. Delegate-heavy states such as California, New Jersey, New York, Illinois and Georgia could play a deciding role in the outcome of both races. But with polling showing a tight Democratic race, and Obama working overtime to split votes in odd-numbered districts, tonight's results won't produce a nominee for the Democrats.

While John McCain spent Super Bowl Sunday in Massachusetts, Mitt Romney made his pitch to the most reliably conservative county in Illinois. At a packed rally of several hundred people at the College of DuPage yesterday, he tried to convince voters here that he is the true conservative standard bearer. Romney vowed that as president he would "stand up for the principles of the Republican Party and to live in the house that Ronald Reagan built."

With the race for the Democratic nomination showdown just days away, and polls showing Obama closing in on Clinton in key Super Duper Tuesday states, the Obama campaign made a huge ad buy during the Super Bowl in the Super Tuesday states, including Alabama, Arizona, Arkansas, California, Connecticut, Delaware, District of Columbia, Georgia, Kansas, Louisiana, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, North Dakota, Oklahoma, Utah, Virginia and Washington, (but, alas, not Illinois)

John McCain changed careers last night, from the candidate who was almost out of money (and the race) last summer to quite possibly the Republican presidential nominee. He's now the man to beat. The close but critical win in Florida gave him 57 delegates and a solid lead going into Super Duper Tuesday, (there are no superdelegates at the Republican National Convention). Hillary Clinton won the non-binding Florida race, a largely symbolic victory that featured virtually no campaigning and earned her no delegates to the convention.

The Tribune Editorial Board released its list of endorsements in the upcoming Illinois primaries on February 5. Among the list are 3rd District Congressman Dan Lipinski (striking a blow to challenger and progressive blog champion Mark Pera) and tenacious ice cream magnate Jim Oberweis -- running for Congress in the 14th District -- who is determined to get himself elected to some office, somewhere, some time (we hear Sugar Grove is looking for a new mayor, perhaps he should start there). They also endorse Senator Dick Durbin's challenger, Steve Sauerberg, who has about as much chance of unseating Durbin as Spanky the Clown.

Michigan defied the conventional wisdom yesterday, giving Mitt Romney 30 delegates to the national convention and his second primary win.

For Michigan Democrats, the choices in today's primary are pretty stark. Late last year, Michigan Senator Carl Levin supported moving Michigan's primary up to January 15 in an attempt to make the state more relevant in this year's race. That move backfired, however, when the Democratic National Committee punished the state party by stripping it of all its delegates at the convention. Party rules mandate that Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada and South Carolina hold the first primaries.

senator Barack Obama some unsolicited advice on how to beat Hillary Clinton for the Democratic nomination. When that didn't work, you took him to task in an op-ed piece for the Wall Street Journal.

Illinois state legislators are at it again today, after yesterday's close-but-no-cigar attempts to resolve the transit funding crisis. The House passed a sales-tax increase plan yesterday, but it fell one vote sort in the Senate; those so-and-sos are going to give it another go today because three of them abstained (courteously?) yesterday.

In what could quite possibly be the nail biter of the season, Hillary Clinton pulled it out last night, winning the New Hampshire Democratic primary by a two to three point lead over Iowa front-runner Barack Obama. While most of the media was writing Hillary's political obituary, she was winning New Hampshire. With the Nevada caucuses next, and the black vote potentially split between the Clintons and Barack Obama, South Carolina may be back in play. In fact, Clinton's win last night showed one of Obama's key weaknesses: his reliance on independent and new voters. Female and older voters seemed to gravitate towards Clinton last night, with 45 percent of female Democratic voters chose Clinton. Voters over the age of 40 also picked Clinton, with nearly 70 percent going for Hillary over Obama.

The big news from the campaign trail yesterday evening was an emotional moment with Hillary Clinton and a group of sympathetic, yet undecided, New Hampshire voters. When asked "how do you do it? How do you keep up ... and who does your hair?", Hillary Clinton choked up as she responded, tears welling up in her eyes. Less widely reported, however, was an incident of two men who heckled her in Salem, NH, holding signs that read "Iron My Shirt", and chanting the same slogan. As the hecklers were removed, Clinton responded "ah, the remnants of sexism" to cheers from the crowd. “I’m also running to break through the highest and hardest glass ceiling,” she told the audience.

Mayor Daley might not do irony well, but Mitt Romney knows how to do momentum.

Last night marked the official beginning of the 2008 presidential season. The close of the Iowa Democratic caucuses saw Barack Obama with 37 percent, John Edwards with 30 percent, and Hillary Clinton in third place with 29 percent of the votes, with 99 percent of Iowa precincts reporting. On the Republican side Mike Huckabee was the big winner.

If you're anything like Chicagoist, you're counting the days (only 382!) 'til Shrub is out and new leadership is in. And hey, America, let's not screw it up this time.

The Chicago Tribune is reporting that the Jim Oberweis campaign will be announcing “a major endorsement” today, and that that endorsement will be from Dennis Hastert. Oberweis is running for the 14th Congressional District seat that was vacated when former Speaker of the House resigned earlier this year. Although Hastert endorsed Oberweis for US Senator in the 2002 Republican primary, Jack Ryan won that race, later withdrawing after his (sexy) divorce files were unsealed. An...

Long-time Republican Congressman Henry Hyde died early this morning at Rush University Medical Center. He was 83. Hyde served 32 years in the House before retiring at the end of last session, and he was recently awarded a Medal of Freedom. He's best known for his role as the chairman of the judiciary committee during the Clinton impeachment proceedings and for the Hyde Amendment, which bans Medicaid from funding abortions except in cases of rape,...

We're trying not to jinx it, but it looks like legislators might be solving the transit crisis, like, tomorrow. Mike Madigan agreed today to push for a Blago-backed plan that would use the State's share of the sales tax on gasoline in Cook and the five collar counties for the RTA. Even Daley's on board. Are we seeing a unicorn? Last week, Blagojevich endorsed Minority Leader Tom Cross's plan that would send around $385...