By Townhall Chicago News Staff
Illinois Republicans dropped to 33 state House seats and 13 state Senate seats after Tuesday’s election, former Republican state Rep. Jeannie Ives said Friday during a radio appearance.
The figures mark one of the steepest declines for the party in recent Illinois history, Ives said, as Democrats expanded their majority in the General Assembly and swept most contested races in DuPage County.
Ives, who represented a northwest suburban district from 2013 to 2019 and later ran for governor as a Republican, gave differing counts for the number of Democratic state representatives during the broadcast, saying at one point the chamber would seat 83 Democrats and at another point 85.
“Illinois is on track to become Rhode Island, which is 90-10 — literally 90-10,” Ives said, referring to the ratio of Democrats to Republicans she expects in the Legislature.
Ives said Nabila Syed defeated Darby Hills, a former Cook County prosecutor, for a state Senate seat she described as previously held by Republicans. She also said a Democratic Socialists of America-endorsed candidate ousted Republican state Sen. Seth Lewis in a DuPage County-area district, though she did not clearly identify the winner by name. Ives said Melissa Bean won a U.S. House seat.
A caller identified as Mike, who said he works for a newspaper in DuPage County, said he voted a largely Republican ticket but backed two candidates he described as independents, Don Tracy and Darren Bailey, for U.S. Senate and governor.
“I looked at all of the voting in DuPage County,” Mike said. “All of these races, these candidates lost by 30 points. Just about all of them.” He said the only local Republican win came in an uncontested county board race.
Ives agreed with that account. “We only saved one county board race,” she said. “Everything else went Democrat.”
A caller identified as Kevin, calling from Austin, Texas, offered Republicans in Illinois a different take on the results.
“Republicans have to stop playing the victim card,” Kevin said. “It’s important to identify what the problem is, but I think you have to balance it with providing what the solution.”
Ives said Democrats are likely to pursue new revenue measures in Springfield, including requests from Chicago Public Schools and the city of Harvey, which she said has asked the state for $30 million. Those figures were not independently detailed during the broadcast.
The new General Assembly is expected to be seated in January. Ives did not specify when final, certified results for the contested seats would be available from the Illinois State Board of Elections.
