IL-05: A Detailed Look at the Special Election

(More phenomenal work from jeffmd – promoted by James L.)

If I lived a few miles south, I’d live smack in the middle of Illinois’ 5th Congressional District.

Given that 12 candidates were running in the election on Tuesday – and that Quigley won with no more than 25% of the vote, I wanted to take a detailed look at the results by precinct.

A few Saturdays ago, I was running errands in Ravenswood. As I rode the Brown Line south towards the Loop, I noticed a distinct pattern in yard (or perhaps more accurately, window) signs – each neighborhood had the majority of signs supporting one candidate. North-South, they roughly went O’Connor, then Fritchey, then Quigley, then Feigenholtz.

So using the results available from the Chicago BoE, I tried to see if these yard signs were actually reflective. I also look at if each candidate did better in the district (whether State House, County Commissioner, or City Ward) that they represented.

I only got around to analyzing results within the city of Chicago though. Illinois (go figure) establishes separate election authorities for the City of Chicago and Suburban Cook County, and the Cook Suburbs didn’t give me the requisite shapefiles to play with.

So, here’s the goody that I think we’re all waiting for: the winner by precinct (within the City of Chicago).

More maps and results below the flip.

Of course, this map doesn’t show what the magnitude of the win in each precinct was, so this is a map that does. The legend might be unclear, so a color in the first column of the box indicates a precinct won by a candidate with 0-20%. In the second column, 20-30%, etc.

Image Hosted by ImageShack.us

Grey indicates a tie in both maps. Just some quick qualitative comments: Wheelan’s 7 precincts all came in Lincoln Park – the most affluent neighborhood of Chicago. Feigenholtz’s strength was in Lakeview, especially in Chicago’s LGBT center along North Halsted. Fritchey did well in Rahm’s homebase of North Center, as well as some outlying precincts here and there. Forys did best in Portage Park – a predominantly Polish neighborhood, and O’Connor did well in his base in Lincoln Square. Quigley’s strongholds are harder to point out – some precincts in Albany Park and Irving Park in the center of the district, but also the sliver of Edgewater that isn’t in the 9th CD, and much of Wrigleyville and Lakeview beyond Belmont.

Just to recap, here were the results from the city of Chicago:



































Wheelan Feigenholtz Fritchey Forys Geoghegan Quigley O’Connor Other
5th CD 3,501 8,261 9,147 5,495 3,228 11,551 6,139 3,452
6.90% 16.27% 18.02% 10.82% 6.36% 22.75% 12.09% 6.80%

Overall, there are 486 precincts in the Chicago part of the district. Quigley won 153, Fritchey 98, Forys 90, Feigenholtz and O’Connor 57 each, and Wheelan 7. Additionally, 23 precincts were tied.

So sure, the maps are pretty and all, but what do they actually indicate? Well, let’s break it down by the various districts involved.

For those of you keeping score:

-Fritchey represents the 11th Legislative District; Feigenholtz represents the 12th.

-Quigley represents the 10th Cook County Commissioner District.

-O’Connor represents the 40th Ward of the City of Chicago.

So by LD first:

Image Hosted by ImageShack.us















































































Wheelan Feigenholtz Fritchey Forys Geoghegan Quigley O’Connor Other
11th LD 1,244 1,674 2,238 94 865 2,812 591 438
12.49% 16.81% 22.48% 0.94% 8.69% 28.24% 5.94% 4.40%
12th LD 652 2,587 440 74 413 1,916 184 238
10.02% 39.78% 6.77% 1.14% 6.35% 29.46% 2.83% 3.66%
Other LD 1,605 4,000 6,469 5,327 1,950 6,823 5,364 2,776
4.68% 11.66% 18.85% 15.52% 5.68% 19.88% 15.63% 8.09%

As you can see, Feigenholtz clearly had the ‘in-district’ effect – earning 40% within the 12th LD compared to 13% outside. She dominated here, winning 42 of 63 precincts, including half with 45%+.

The effect for Fritchey is less clear, he earned 22% within the 11th LD compared to 17% outside. He carried 26 of 91 precincts, compared to Quigley’s 48.

For Cook County Commission Districts:

Image Hosted by ImageShack.us

























































Wheelan Feigenholtz Fritchey Forys Geoghegan Quigley O’Connor Other
10th Commis. 1,296 3,577 1,089 235 795 3,477 1,876 508
10.08% 27.83% 8.47% 1.83% 6.19% 27.05% 14.60% 3.95%
Other Commis. 2,205 4,684 8,058 5,260 2,433 8,074 4,263 2,944
5.81% 12.35% 21.25% 13.87% 6.42% 21.29% 11.24% 7.76%

The effect for Quigley is of questionable magnitude as well. He got 27% inside the 10th Commis, compared to 21% outside. Precinct-wise, his numbers weren’t amazing either, winning 37 of 121 – compared to Fritchey’s 48. For those of you with fast math skills, that means Quigley won 30.5% of precincts within his district and 32% of those not. Go figure.

Incidentally, yes, the 10th Commissioner district is contiguous – it simply runs outside the 5th, so I did not display it here.



Lastly, by city ward:

Image Hosted by ImageShack.us

























































Wheelan Feigenholtz Fritchey Forys Geoghegan Quigley O’Connor Other
40th Ward 97 323 197 16 200 445 1,562 91
3.31% 11.02% 6.72% 0.55% 6.82% 15.18% 53.29% 3.10%
Other Wards 3,404 7,938 8,950 5,479 3,028 11,106 4,577 3,361
7.11% 16.59% 18.71% 11.45% 6.33% 23.21% 9.57% 7.03%

The ‘home district’ effect is clearest for 40th Ward Alderman O’Connor. He earned a stunning 53% within his ward, compared to 10% throughout the rest of the city. He swept 22 of 27 precincts as well. 12 of these 22 yielded 60%+ for him. Remnants of the machine? I’ll leave you to decide.

So was there a home district effect? Maybe. I think Quigley was able to win simply because he wasn’t limited to it. He was able to perform consistently both within and outside the 10th Commissioner district – enough to squeeze out a win.

SSP Daily Digest: 2/27

NH-Sen: Oh, darn. Ex-Sen. Bob Smith isn’t planning to run in the GOP primary for Judd Gregg’s open senate seat. He said he prefers to remain a Florida resident.

OH-Sen: Add a fourth candidate (and, with Tyrone Yates, a second African-American with a less-than-statewide profile) to the mix in the Ohio senate primary: Cuyahoga County Commissioner Peter Lawson Jones. Last week he told Ohio Daily Blog that he’d be forming an exploratory committee this week. (No telling if that actually happened.)

OH-02: You may remember David Krikorian, an independent who racked up double-digits in last year’s Schmidt/Wulsin faceoff. He’s announced that he’s going to seek the Democratic nomination for a rerun, as a loud ‘n’ proud Blue Dog.

IL-05: It’s the last weekend of campaigning before the Mar. 3 primary for the special election to fill Rahm Emanuel’s seat. With 12 candidates and projected low turnout, basically anything can happen. While Emanuel hasn’t endorsed, Politico does observe that there’s a Sara Feigenholtz sign in his yard in Chicago.

DCCC: Chris Van Hollen announced his 2009-10 chair for candidate recruitment: Rep. Steve Israel (of NY-02). He also announced that Robby Mook, most recently Jeanne Shaheen’s campaign manager, will take over as the DCCC’s political director.

FEC: This ought to make James’s job a lot easier: Russ Feingold has introduced legislation, widely expected to pass, requiring Senate candidates to electronically file their campaign finance reports with the FEC, the way House candidates already do. Currently, Senate filings are paper-only.

KY-St Sen.: Here’s a bit of good news that’s a few weeks old that eluded us until now: a Democratic candidate, Mike Reynolds, won the Feb. 11 special election to fill the state senate seat vacated by Republican Brett Guthrie (elected in KY-02 in November). The 32nd, based in Bowling Green, is in a deep red area at the federal level, but apparently still maintains a downballot Dem tradition. The GOP still controls the state senate, 21-16-1.

NYC: SSP doesn’t usually delve into county-level governance, but this involves one of the legal community’s most legendary members: Bob Morgenthau, the District Attorney of New York County (aka Manhattan), has decided not to go for a 10th term. Currently 89 years old, he’s been in office for 35 years.

Retread Watch: Yeah, there’s some precedent for this. But isn’t it a little sad that twice-defeated House loser Jeb Bradley is considering a run for New Hampshire state Senate?

Sara Feigenholtz for IL-5

Soon Rep. Rahm “Rahmbo” Emanuel will be leaving his congressional seat vacant in order to become Barack Obama’s chief of staff.  Emanuel represents Illinois 5th District, which includes northern portions of Chicago as well as some suburbs west of the city. John Kerry won this district 67-23 in 2004, and Barack Obama certainly did much better than that.  Of course, Emanuel’s resignation will set up a special election sometime in the near future.

The general election will be uncompetitive, so this is an excellent chance to get a very progressive Democrat elected to this district.  That Democrat could be Rep. Sara Feigenholtz.  Feigenholtz was elected to the Illinois State House in 1995, and since then she has built a reputation as one of the most liberal members in the entire body.  

Yesterday Feigenholtz announced she is forming a campaign committee to explore a run for the 5th District.  Part of the e-mail to her supporters reads:

As you know, Congressman Rahm Emanuel will be resigning from the U.S. House of Representatives to serve in the Obama administration.  I believe this creates an opportunity for another progressive thinker, such as myself, to lead the 5th District. . . To let our dreams of a better tomorrow end with the November 4th election would be an affront to those very principles Americans were hoping to reclaim this year. . . I am asking you to believe in my capacity to lead once again, and embark upon this journey with me.

Let’s face it, Emanuel is not as progressive as he could be, especially not from such a strongly Democratic District.  Feigenholtz, on the other hand, is 100% Pro-Choice, Supports Gay Marriage, and is a solid progressive on every other issue.  

To my knowledge, Feigenholtz is the only announced candidate, but Emanuel hasn’t even resigned yet, and there is likely to be more.  There is no date yet set for the Special Primary or Election.  But if we rally around Feigenholtz early, we can make sure that a solid progressive represents this district.

On the Issues:

http://votesmart.org/npat.php?…

House Site

http://www.staterepsara.com/

Act Blue Page

http://www.actblue.com/contrib…