Tag: jay footlik

again, the most important news is that early voting has begun.  for those who live in illinois’ 10th congressional district, the ballot positions for the primary election are:

Daniel J. Seals

Jay K. Footlik

only dan seals completed the voter guide question.  his response notes:

After a short 11-month campaign and a lot of hard work, Dan shocked the pundits and incumbent Mark Kirk by winning 47 percent in the election. Dan is vying for the seat again in 2008, and this time with even more support.

the financial disclosure reports are out.  seals reports a healthy “quarter:”

Total Contributions

Qtr: $329,731.01

Tot: $904,762.27

Total Operating Expenditures

Qtr: $199,646.21

Tot: $383,183.77

CoH: $627167.58

footlik’s report confirms what people are seeing on the ground:

Total Contributions

Qtr: $133,433.08

Tot: $422,308.08

Total Operating Expenditures

Qtr: $414,415.88

Tot: $480,341.28

CoH: $133,351.09

the saddest thing is, despite footlik’s considerable drop-off in donations, he still managed to raise in the 4th quarter pretty much what john laesch raised in an entire year.

being newspaper endorsement season, endorsements lead the news in this race, too.  seals has swept these: he got the pioneer press endorsement, the daily herald endorsement as well as the chicago tribune’s:

Seals gets the edge, based on a better grasp of local issues and concerns. He is endorsed.

the sun-times endorsement was more expansive:

Seals our choice in the 10th District

Democratic voters in Illinois’ 10th Congressional District on Chicago’s North Shore should consider themselves lucky.

Two strong candidates are running in the Feb. 5 primary, vying for the chance to take on Republican incumbent Rep. Mark Kirk, who is running unopposed.

[…]

But the endorsement goes to Seals, who has significantly more local support than Footlik. We like his well-rounded background, including an international economics master’s degree, fluency in Japanese and a stint working for the federal government in Washington.

He also has an MBA and worked as director of marketing at GE Capital, experiences we hope prove helpful in national economic matters. He is the son of former Chicago Bears guard George Seals and a social worker.

Several of Seals’ policy ideas are more fleshed out than Footlik’s, particularly on the economy and immigration reform, including a push for Mexico to do more to control the flow of immigrants and boost its own economy.

Seals also has the best chance to defeat Kirk.

jay did get another endorsement that went last time to dan seals, that of the jewish political alliance of illinois.  dan, otoh, got dick durbin’s endorsement again.  durbin noted, as reported by the sun-times:

“If Dan Seals were not the candidate, Jay would be a very interesting choice,” Durbin said. “But Dan has been battle-tested. He knows the district inside and out. His opponent does not have that kind of experience.”

the chicago tribune used this quote:

“I think he’s one of our strongest congressional candidates in the country, and he proved it last time,” Durbin said. “He came very close, and I think he deserves another chance at it. I think he’s battle-tested and I’m happy to support his candidacy.”

the journal also covered durbin’s endorsement of seals.

chicago public radio covered the race.  the chicago tribune noted that the difference in name recognition may be the biggest difference between footlik and seals.  the ap story observes that our economic difficulties is of great concern even in illinois’ wealthiest congressional district.

the debates between footlik and seals got more attention.  the 10th dems convention got coverage, as well, with a seals’ slant here and here.  seals got 180 votes in the straw poll while footlik received 44 votes.  this margin, you might remember, reflects the same margin found in seals’ internal poll.  and these are democratic activists — all of whom were likely to be aware, at least, of footlik’s candidacy.

if you noticed, these roundups have a specific format.  the first section is basically the news reported by the mainstream media.  the second section i call, what’s new.  this is the segment were i talk about the blogs and websites, etc.  skokie talk, a website for jay’s hometown of skokie (in the 9th CD represented by jan schakowsky) notes this good news for jay:

Footlik currently lives in Buffalo Grove with his wife and daughter. He’s expecting another daughter in February.

congratulations, jay.  i’m sure i speak for many people when i say that.

jta, a jewish news service, has increased it’s coverage of this race dramatically.  it now has a reporter on the ground (jacob berkman).  it reports footlik’s charges about dan’s position at northwestern, about footlik’s “jewish credentials,” how some were offended by footlik’s humor and about how much the footlik-seals matchup mirrors obama and hillary.  the latter write-up was called by archpundit a good overview:

My read is that Jay is a great guy and a good candidate, but given Seals is well liked by Democrats in the District and most understand you need to run twice to win, most of the reasons for supporting Jay aren’t catching with people. Jay’s campaign would argue he’s stronger in a general, but I’m not sure that the greater burden of building up name recognition wouldn’t make it just as difficult. Last time, it was a seven point difference with virtually no national help for Dan.

I like Jay and would like to see him run for something another time, but I don’t see a compelling case as to why Seals shouldn’t get a second shot given how well he did without national support last time.

it’s obvious that footlik made a valiant effort, and he clearly has tremendous political talent.  i’m pretty critical of “policy wonks,” just because i’ve had to deal with the frustrations that voters have trying to understand them.

ellen’s 10th CD blog continues to be the leader in coverage of this race.  she live blogged the lwv debate in arlington heights, covered a meet and greet for seals the next day, attended the durbin endorsement, live blogged the 10th dems convention, reported the straw poll results, noted the cpr story and broke the 21st century dems’ endorsement of seals.

these two campaigns are revving up towards election day.  the seals campaign reports that:

Voters are responding enthusiastically to Dan’s message of bringing wholesale change to Washington. On issues like the war, healthcare, and the economy, they are ready for a new direction.

Dan’s message is (and has always been) that it’s time for a change in the course of our country and the way business is done in Washington.

it’s difficult for me to see how footlik pulls this out, but what i will be looking at when the election returns come in is whether footlik is able to win the dominant jewish areas in the district (highland park, glencoe, buffalo grove).  what i want to test is whether jay’s message that he would do much better against kirk resonates in that community.  if jay wins these areas, it would signal that dan has some work to do to strengthen his position among jewish voters.

this race hasn’t turned out to be as heated as i feared or as competitive as i thought possible.  in the end, democrats in the 10th seem satisfied with the leader they recruited in 2006 to beat mark kirk.  this will be the final IL-10th roundup, not because there won’t be more news, but because it’s increasingly apparent this one has been decided…

this race isn’t generating as much coverage as the others, simply because it is turning out to be not much of a race.  the endorsement interview at the chicago tribune can be found here:

if you watch this video, which was ended abruptly where others were extended, the interviewer asks jay footlik the question that is on everyone’s mind: why are you running, and “risk the possibility of perhaps splitting sensibilities among democrats when he (seals) came so close last time?”  it’s the question on many democrat’s minds in the tenth.

mark kirk’s supporters would like this to be more of a race.  i suspect footlik’s supporters would, too.  but we’re just not hearing it on the ground.  footlik’s name recognition still seems to be problematic, and it doesn’t appear that dan seals will have to spend as much money to beat footlik as i’d wager they planned to spend.

the tribune covered the session of the video above, noting:

The two Democrats seeking to unseat U.S. Rep. Mark Kirk (R-Ill.) from his North Shore seat clashed on the Middle East and where they live Tuesday in their first meeting of the campaign season.

Former White House adviser Jay Footlik criticized Democratic primary opponent Dan Seals for saying during his previous congressional run that he would support “peace” in a conflict between Iran and Israel.

[…]

Footlik, who runs a homeland security consulting business, said he currently resides in Buffalo Grove.

Seals then got Footlik to admit he’s only renting a house in the district.

footlik, who likes to tell his audience that he started his career as “the cute kid,” played it cute about the residency issue:

Jay Footlik, a Democratic candidate for Congress in the North Suburban 10th District, sent out a map this week showing four houses for sale in the district under $400,000 in case his opponent in the Democratic primary, Dan Seals, wants to buy one.

this stunt would have been more cute if footlik’s wife hadn’t told people they were planning on buying a house in the 10th congressional district.  it makes you wonder if the kirk campaign has an office pool for when footlik returns to his home within the beltway.

the daily herald also wrote about their endorsement session:

Democratic congressional candidate Dan Seals says lobbyists can’t change Washington, but opponent Jay Footlik says that neither can neophytes.

“I’ve already delivered real results,” Footlik argued, referring to his work as a security consultant, Middle East policy adviser and lobbyist for foreign interests. “I have been involved in trying to find solutions.”

But business consultant Seals argues Footlik doesn’t have the kind of experience voters want.

“If you are going to deliver change, I don’t think you can do that as a lobbyist,” said the Wilmette resident.

this has been a busy week for the two campaigns in the 10th.  three debates were scheduled, one remaining for tomorrow night (lwv forum at the arlington heights library).  several papers covered last night’s exchange.  in a spirited exchange of the two candidates, they went deep into local issues.  on transportation issues, seals wants to utilize the lake to its fullest extent as a transportation system while footlik supports expanding o’hare and getting the municipalities to cooperate on roads.  on the environment, seals thinks the lake is our greatest resource and must be protected.  he used the recent bp amoco fiasco as just one example.  footlik agrees that while kirk makes a appearance about bp, he’s done nothing.  seals also noted that he would be willing to sign on for more punitive action against those companies that discriminate.  

both candidates were asked what 2 committees and what 2 pieces of legislation would you like.  seals said he wants to sit on the education and armed forces committees and would sponsor troops returning in a year.  footlik said he wants to sit on the transportation and foreign affairs committees.  press coverage of the debate had one write:

Seals, a business consultant at Northwestern University said he is running to change Washington, D.C.

“We need to change healthcare, the war in Iraq, the deficit and business overall in Washington,” said Seals.

Seals said he believes the government is putting freedom at odds with security when it comes to electronic surveillance and other methods used by Homeland Security.

“Wire tapping, the eavesdropping, and the torture our troops are putting on some of the prisoners are just some examples that are having an opposite effect on security,” Seals said. “We need to focus on police work and good intelligence by addressing border issues and reading security checks.”

Footlik said the country needs to reach out to the Muslim world and communicate in a more effective way.

“There are great solutions for anti-terrorism laws, but it starts with first responders like police and fire back home,” said Footlik.

Back home, Seals believes Congress should pass the Children’s Health and Medicare Protection Act, because children “deserve our care,” he said.

there were other stories about the endorsements the two are getting.  the news sun notes that footlik got the endorsement of the lake county federation of teachers while seals won the endorsement of the IFT’s northwest suburban teachers union.  the tribune wrote about the switch to footlik, while the pioneer press said that “Jay Footlik believes his campaign is gaining momentum with the endorsement of two major teachers’ unions.”

otoh, one of footlik’s mailers got a different reaction than his campaign probably wanted.  Footlik mailing draws fire was a headline in the winnetka talk:

The Footlik campaign says the ad was meant to talk about his faith in a humorous way, and the work he has done on issues important to the Jewish community and in promoting Middle East peace.

But others did not find the mailing so funny.

“I was just offended by the fact that whole piece had nothing to do with the issues,” said Buffalo Grove resident Jon Altenberg, who is Jewish. “The whole piece is based on the fact he’s Jewish. I’m Jewish, and I don’t think the fact that someone’s Jewish should have any relevance on whether he gets my vote or not.”

In a Letter to the Editor, Altenberg said the mailing “uses Jewish stereotypes and slang to try to insinuate that Jay Footlik is the only candidate to vote for simply because he has a Jewish surname.”

“If anybody who was not Jewish used the same terms, I think it would be seen as offensive,” he said.

Altenberg said he’s talked to neighbors who are not Jewish and they indicated they had not received the mailing.

sun times columnist neil steinberg called the mailer pandering to the northshore’s jewish voters.  it appears, though, that reaction to the mailer broke on generational lines, with older jewish voters finding it as humorous as it was intended.

in the ‘what’s new’ department, the seals campaign reports:

A recent poll by Garin-Hart-Yang Research showed Dan leading his primary opponent 58-10

the campaign also notes that “Dan was endorsed by the Pioneer Press on Thursday, January 10.”  seals has won the “endorsement race,” posting new endorsements by

* AFL-CIO

* Asian American Action Fund of Greater Chicago

* Communications Workers of America

* International Association of Machinists

* International Brotherhood of Boilermakers

* Illinois Federation of Teachers- Northwest Suburban Teachers Union Local 1211

* Independent Voters of Illinois-IPO

* International Longshoreman’s Association

* Sheet Metal Workers International Association

* United Auto Workers

* United Food and Commercial Workers

* United Transportation Union

footlik got some good blog support from the teacher’s union endorsement.  his home town bulletin board had a nice appeal:

Niles North alumnus Jay Footlik is running for Congress. Those of us who are Skokie residents, including Jay’s mom, can’t vote for him, because we living in the 9th congressional district. This doesn’t mean we can’t help.

a volunteer from miami university had a really sweet post about her experience helping on footlik’s campaign and what it means.  otoh, local blogstar, ellen gill asked fellow voters if they had received on the calls talked about in that volunteer’s post.

supporters of dan seals put up a considerable amount of video in the last month.  one of these week’s debate had two questions posted, one on alternative energy and another on who’s his political role model.  seals’ wilmette coffee in december was also posted, part one is here, part two is here and the final segment is here.  the seals campaign has this video, Get to Know Dan!  and video from the yearlykos future leader’s forum, where seals was a panelist, is now online.  

there’s a lot of stuff coming up.  jay footlik now has an events section on his website, although the calendar doesn’t seem to be for the general public (there’s no address listed for each item).  the seals campaign continues to update it’s calendar page.  and the league of women voters debate is tomorrow at the arlington heights library.

seals’ financial picture continues to get brighter.  his actblue page shows he’s raised $258,784 from 1,093 donors across actblue.  footlik still hasn’t raised a dime on actblue.  full fund-raising numbers aren’t due in illinois until after the 16th.

footlik’s prospects don’t look that good.  it’s not just the poll numbers; voters still don’t know who footlik is, and when they do, they wonder — just like the tribune interviewer — why he’s running.  otoh, footlik’s challenge has forced the seals’ campaign to organize earlier, and knock on more doors than they probably would have otherwise.  as seals turns his attention to unifying democrats in the 10th around his candidacy, and then a more potent challenge against mark kirk, he continues to be a down to earth, charismatic agent for change.

perhaps the most frequent question about the race for the democratic nomination for congress in the 10th congressional district — what some consider to be “the biggest congressional race next year in Illinois” — is why is there a primary?  lynn sweet predicts:

The contest will be one of the most expensive in the nation. Third quarter fund-raising reports gives Seals $498,872 cash on hand; Footlik, making his first run for office, has a $414,018 warchest. The winner faces Kirk, who has stockpiled $1.5 million and has no primary opponent.

“The issue here,” carol marin says, “is whether the battle between Seals and Footlik will splinter Jewish voters, sap each campaign of cash and strength in the primary, and give Kirk the advantage he needs to capture a fifth term.”

while these sentiments may continue to be frequently voiced about this race, it isn’t an interesting lens through which to view the race because there is a primary.  instead, i find it more interesting to note that this election really is a classic battle between two schools of thought: the “perfect candidate” model — behind which illinois machine democrats are a prime driving force — and the grassroots model.

jay footlik presents himself to the voters in the mold of the “perfect candidate” for the 10th: he’s jewish, he’s connected to democratic royalty, he has a strong connection to israel, and he promises to peal off jewish supporters of mark kirk.  according to this analysis, a jewish democrat is the only candidate who can defeat mark kirk because they are the only opponent who can neutralize the advantage kirk has (or is perceived to have) with regard to the issue of israel.  some estimate that up to 20% of the 10th is jewish.

the problem with this proposition is that every candidate who ran against mark kirk before dan seals was a jewish democrat — and they all lost.  and it ignores the fact that, regardless of who runs, kirk will make an issue out of his strong support of israel and use it as a wedge issue.  regardless of who runs.

the footlik campaign has also tried to draw the contrast that jay has more experience in government than his democratic opponent.  this might be a strong contrast if mark kirk didn’t have more experience in government than jay footlik.  if experience is the frame under which this campaign is fought, kirk wins.  it is kirk’s experience as (former congressman) john porter’s chief of staff, kirk’s predecessor, that has kept him in office.  porter was, and continues to be, popular among the voters of the 10th, and kirk has won by brandishing his close connection to porter.

the other thing that footlik seems to be hanging his hat on is, “dan seals is likeable, but he didn’t get it done last time.”  since footlik lived in d.c. in 2006, he is aware of the national trend (well, sorta) of the blue wave in 2006 (at least in new york, pennsylvania, ohio, florida, indiana, arizona, new hampshire, connecticutt, iowa and minnesota).  and because he had no ties to the il-10th in 2006, he’s clearly unaware that topinka (republican gubernatorial candidate) and peraica (republican cook county president candidate) won in the district.  not exactly a good year — let alone great year — for democrats in the 10th.  but that’s what happens when you parachute into the state, even if you are perceived (by some) as the perfect candidate for the district.

given the fact that footlik is new to the district, he’s had to start his media campaign early.  he’s already mailed twice into the district (local republican blog team america has the mailers: first and second).  footlik has also made two cable buys in at least some areas of the 10th, value and square.  footlik has been meeting with influentials in the 10th privately, but has skipped significant local political events.

footlik’s almost invisible campaign contrasts significantly with the grassroots-driven, netroots favored campaign of dan seals.  named a future leader for yearlykos, supported nationally by the major blogs through their blue majority project, as well as by local bloggers.  seals benefits significantly from the commitment made by the grassroots, significantly through the tenth dems — the group that helped recruit him to run for congress in the tenth — to turn the tenth blue.  an innovative grassroots organization, lead by former congressional candidate lauren beth gash, the tenth dems has taken the lead in identifying and training local democratic activists, many (if not most) who participate in seals’ campaign.  add to that the support of the local democratic infrastructure, whether jan schakowsky to the south or melissa bean to the north and west and senators obama and durbin, as well as the township democratic organizations, and you can see why the seals campaign is building a strong organization capable of winning in this highly competitive swing district.

often compared to barack obama by voters and contributors, seals has offered a comprehensive vision for change in the tenth.  his campaign has systematically gone about and identified its weaknesses from 2006 and set about to correct them.  they are creating a rather extensive precinct organization and providing advanced training for their precinct captains.  one result of this approach can be found in the 4,416 signatures they collected on seals’ nominating petitions.  the seals campaign promises an even more aggressive voter outreach effort than implemented in 2006.

the seals campaign combines this grassroots approach with traditional campaigning.  they’ve conducted a benchmark poll for the primary, giving seals “a commanding lead:”

Seals leads Footlik 58 percent to 6 percent in the poll, which surveyed 404 likely primary voters. It also shows Seals with a 69-24 advantage in name recognition.

rather extensive voter contact and media programs are planned, incorporating the results of that poll.  

while jay footlik sports one endorsement so far, dan seals has garnered every democratic official in the tenth, as well as former 10th congressman abner mikva, congresswoman schakowsky and  congressman jim clyburn.  add to that the union powerhouses, seiu and afscme, illinois progressive leader citizen action-illinois and the two democratic township organizations which have endorsed so far, and you get an idea of seals’ strength in the primary.

this strength has been borne out by the results of the two candidates’ fundraising in the district.  footlik has motivated 16 locals to contribute to his campaign, getting about 6% of his money from the 10th.  seals, otoh, got more than 80% locally.  seals’ fundraising is so impressive, he’s on the top ten list of non-incumbents running this time.  seals’ support is so strong locally that we’ve seen reports of petition collectors pretending to be passing for seals in order to get signatures for footlik.  

you can really see the difference on the ground.  in contrast to reports of paid circulators for footlik, seals had 76 volunteer petition circulators who collected his 4,416 signatures.  seals is conducting numerous grassroots events out of their lake cook plaza office (2nd fl professional offices, 405 lake cook road; within walking distance to lake cook metra Station), including field trainings (two thus far), phone banking, canvassing and several different types of outreach events (house parties, coffees, meet & greets).  over 100 people attended a seals event last wednesday night at pinstripes in northbrook.  they are continuing to phone bank nightly, and have canvassing scheduled every saturday (meet at office at 12:00 p.m.), as well as outreach events throughout the district.  ongoing events are listed on the seals calendar.

i made repeated efforts to reach the footlik campaign to ask these same questions (in fact, i’ll pose the questions i asked of all the congressional campaigns in the comments), but they never got back to me.  that is why this diary, planned for friday, wasn’t posted until now.  even the first question (do you have a campaign headquarters and where) couldn’t be answered by the person who answered the phone.  you may have observed that footlik’s campaign office address isn’t listed on their website, but this is in keeping with the secretive nature of their whole campaign.  (i had told jay that i would be doing this series at yearlykos and he said they were eager to participate.)

there is an obvious answer to the most frequent question, which was posed in the opening paragraph.  the reason that there’s a primary is that this seat is ready to turn blue.  it’s got a pvi of 3.5, and the biggest difference between 2008 and 2006 is that there will be a popular democrat running for president — perhaps even barack obama, who endorsed seals in 2006.  illinoisians know how unpopular governor blagojevich was (and is), and the circumstances surrounding the elevation of todd stroger as the democratic candidate for cook county board president won’t be repeated.

but it’s more than that.  in 2006, seals expected to win the parts of the 10th in cook county — but didn’t.  the expected edge in new trier never appeared, minority voting in waukegan and north chicago was suppressed, and the western half of the 10th congressional district went decidedly for kirk.  dan seals and his campaign is not only battle hardened, but understands the complexities of the tenth gained by experience in an entire election cycle.  only seals has seen kirk’s 72-hour project (really, final week push) that mobilized more volunteers than had been seen on kirk’s behalf before.  but the biggest difference between 2006 and 2008 is that there was still doubt that dan could win in 2006, but there’s real confidence that if they can minimize their weaknesses, dan seals can beat mark kirk in 2008.

the movement of the middle east towards peace can only help.  if israel does not feel threatened, dan seals is the biggest beneficiary.  kirk’s voicing of a mortal threat to israel to peel away jewish democrats from the democratic candidate (regardless of who it is) will be senseless if their no perception of mortal threat exists.  the dynamics of the 10th in 2008 is dramatically different than in 2006, and these favor dan seals…