Out of all the IL races, this one has gotten the most attention. Hope she wins as her competition lack a lot of conviction for the modern era.
Meanwhile there’s a very important senate seat in IL for Durbins seat where the polling lead for the dem primary is a total corporate shill and the other two are better not a super clean cut given stumbling around ostensibly straightforward geopolitical questions.
Are you in IL or do you know it well enough to comment?
I am in IL and have been following these races closely. Did my early voting today too.
How receptive would you say Chicagolanders are to outside influence? What I mean, and why I ask, is that I agree there is a huge amount of attention on this race, and also, is that I think different states accept varying degrees of outside influence on their elections. For example, I think states like, idk, Maine for example, I think Mainers get particularly annoyed by any perceived outside influence on their election. They'll re-elect Susan Collins just to spite the national party; they'll stick with the guy with an alleged Nazi tattoo because it looked like a smear campaign, like the oppo was coming from Schumer/ the national party.
Some other states are like this, Wyoming, Minnesota, Wisconsin. I could probably put together a list. Other states are less insular, like California, New York, maybe Texas, Arizona.
Whats the mood on the ground? Does it feel like the attention on this race is helping or hurting Abughazaleh? How is Chicago feelign?
For my line of work, I get to talk to a lot of people and travel around the Chicagoland area within and beyond her district.
To address your question head on, I would say the city is average in the sense that people are largely disengaged despite national attention. This is not to say there’s not a motivated group she’s identified and resonate with her that may have been switched on by National media. But the undecided polling number proportion echo the ambivalent sentiment people here have as they go about their daily lives on this race in general let alone external influence. This being said from driving around the IL09 area, I see a lot more Kat signs than i do Biss.
Taking a step back, it is wild to think that a notable amount of Chicagoans would still be this aloof given all the ICE stuff that happened this past year. I don’t know how well this was reported nationally, but there were a lot of signs I would see around town that were posted on streets or street corners warning others that someone or a group of people were abducted by ICE there. People are generally back to their normal lives and going about the mundane but the backdrop of what happened is all weird and super fucked.
I'm not in IL but have donated to her campaign I think 4-5 times now.
Here's hoping.
“We don’t know”
Aipac
Translation: "We do know, we just want to scare you instead of tell you because you might like her."
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