Illinois

There are few Democratic incumbents more in need of a primary than Chicago Blue Dog Dan Lipinski. This session, when it came to crucial roll calls, Lipinski has voted more frequently with Boehner and the GOP than with progressives. His ProgressivePunch crucial vote score is an abysmal 41.94-- among the 10 worst Democrats in Congress. And, as we discovered this week, he finally does have an opponent: Oren Jacobson, the son of a teacher and a self-employed immigrant. Oren is a progressive tech entrepreneur with over a decade of leadership experience in the private sector.

Last month we met Elgin-based Illinois state Senator Mike Noland as he weighed the notion of running for the IL-08 congressional seat that Tammy Duckworth is giving up to run for the U.S. Senate. Nolan is far more progressive, not just than anyone the GOP would ever put up, but than the professional class of political hack the DCCC is likely to rally around.

Several Illinois youths considered ‘at risk’ could be looking at a new career in the medical marijuana industry due to a generous donation to the city of Bloomington by Curative Health, Inc. – a medical marijuana corporation based in New York.
In case you’re wondering here is what ‘at-risk’ youth means:

In 2008, when Aaron Schock declared his leadership PAC-- the GOP Generation Y Fund-- was open for business, Schock was the youngest Member of Congress and he claimed the PAC was meant to help elect more young Republican Members. Last cycle Schock raised $782,233 and distributed 510,404 to Republicans to House seats. Electing "young" Republicans, however, doesn't seem to have been on his mind. Among recipients of his largesse were elderly conservatives like, to whom he handed out checks in $5 and $10 thousand increments:

With Tammy Duckworth running for Mark Kirk's Senate seat, in the IL-08 district just northwest of Chicago (Schaumburg, Elgin, Carpentersville, Carol Stream, Hoffman Estates, Elk Grove Village, Bloomingdale)-- PVI D+8-- there's a rare opportunity to replace a careerist-centrist with a populist activist.

Blue America has a page devoted to progressives running for the U.S. Senate in 2016. There aren't many candidates so far; we're looking forward to adding Russ Feingold (D-WI) soon. But we know our endorsement list isn't going to get too long.

IL-10 Dems Schneider & RoteringYesterday 4 generally conservative Democrats-- Heidi Heitkamp (ND), Bob Casey (PA), Joe Manchin (WV) and Joe Donnelly (IN)-- voted with the GOP to end the Senate Democrats' filibuster of an anti-human trafficking bill that includes anti-Choice provisions.

Tom Cotton now claims he was just joking aroundAnyone who followed Cotton's single term in the House or his campaigns for the House and, last year, for the Senate already had a good idea about what they were dealing with: a manipulative extremist who will say or do anything to advance his childish far right-wing agenda. And he comes wrapped up in a Harvard education with a fancy magna cum laude bow, making it easy to assume he might know what he's talking about.

Maybe Aaron Schock's congressional seat isn't as safe as we've been saying it is. The seat was redrawn in 2010 by the Democratic Illinois legislature to concentrate Republicans in one district in order to make IL-13 and IL-17 safe for Democrats.

In 2010, Illinois Democrats found themselves in complete control of the state government again. Time to gerrymander the state? It certainly worked out well for Republican Aaron Schock.Aaron Schock was supposed to represent a new breed of Illinois Republicans-- suitably reactionary, if not crazy-fanatic, on the inside but superficially kind of like a normal person.