The race over Republican Tracy was called as soon as the polls closed.
By MAGGIE DOUGHERTY & BERNARDA MALEVSKA
Capitol News Illinois
mdougherty@capitolnewsillinois.com
Article Summary
- Democrat Lieutenant Gov. Juliana Stratton easily wins race for U.S. senator in Illinois.
- Republican lawyer Don Tracy, who cast himself as a pragmatic conservative, was a distant second.
- Stratton will replace U.S. Sen. Dick Durbin, who held the seat for three decades and is retiring.
This summary was written by the reporters and editors who worked on this story.
CHICAGO — Democratic Lt. Gov. Juliana Stratton will become Illinois’ next U.S. senator after defeating former Illinois Republican Party Chairman Don Tracy in a blue wave that swept Democrats into power across the nation.
The Associated Press called the race as soon as the polls closed. With 73% of votes counted at 10 p.m., Stratton had 61% of the vote to 37% for Tracy, a margin of about 788,000 votes out of more than 1.8 million cast. Independent Whitfield Harrington was a distant third with 1.6%.
Stratton, who has served as lieutenant governor under Gov. JB Pritzker for the past eight years, greeted cheering supporters at an election watch party in Chicago’s South Side.
“For 2 years, we’ve been hard at work, organizing and showing up non-stop. But this campaign was never about Election Day. It’s about every day that comes after,” Stratton said. “Because now, we get to work.”
Gov. JB Pritzker, who was easily elected to a third term Tuesday, said of Stratton:
“I could not be prouder of my friend and partner in governance, Senator-elect Juliana Stratton. For eight years, I have watched her approach every aspect of public service with the qualities that matter most: a willingness to listen, kindness, and a genuine desire to improve Illinoisans’ lives. Illinois could not have asked for a better fighter to stand up to Donald Trump’s tyranny in Washington. Juliana will be a fantastic senator.”
Stratton led by double digits in polls against Tracy, a Springfield lawyer and businessman and self-described underdog, in the race to fill the seat held the last three decades by retiring Democratic U.S. Sen. Dick Durbin.
Stratton’s win will make her the fourth Black lawmaker to hold a U.S. Senate seat for Illinois and the second Black woman to do so after Democrat Carol Moseley Braun, who was elected in 1993.
It also means Illinois retains its rank as the top state for electing Black lawmakers to the U.S. Senate — a legacy that notably includes former U.S. President Barack Obama and Moseley Braun. And, with Stratton joining U.S. Sen. Tammy Duckworth, Illinois will become the first state to have two women of color simultaneously serving in the U.S. Senate.
Duckworth thanked her longtime legislative partner Durbin before turning her attention to the path ahead with Stratton by her side.
“I could not be more grateful because now I get to go kick some ass with the best partner I have ever asked for,” Duckworth said. “The road ahead is long, but the destination is worth it. Our democracy is worth it, Illinois is worth it, and I cannot be afraid to fight for all of it alongside Juliana.”
Stratton’s campaign, bolstered in the primary by $10 million from Pritzker’s electoral war chest, has taken an unapologetically progressive stance and aimed to tie her opponent to President Donald Trump, who had flailing approval ratings.
Tracy was notably absent from Trump’s list of endorsements for Illinois Republicans, though he told reporters at the State Fair he would “certainly welcome it.” Tracy sought to paint Stratton as a tax-and-spend liberal and a socialist, contrasting himself as a pragmatic conservative.
Tracy, who spent the afternoon visiting polling locations, showed up to speak to his supporters in a restaurant in Springfield about 10 p.m. Tuesday.
Tracy told supporters that he called Stratton to congratulate her on her win.
“I asked her not to forget the people that voted on the other side,” said Tracy. “I’ve offered to help her if there’s any way I can, in that regard. We need more bipartisanship in this state, in this country, not less.”
Harrington, 46, is a Chicago pastor and former financial services professional. He was running as the nominee for the American Center Party to give voters an option beyond the established two parties.
Beyond the bare minimum
Stratton, 61, won her primary in a crowded field, overtaking longtime frontrunner and aggressive fundraiser Raja Krishnamoorthi and U.S. Rep. Robin Kelly.
Before entering politics, Stratton founded a consulting firm where she served as an arbitrator and administrative law judge for government agencies. She also held several leadership positions at organizations devoted to public safety and criminal justice reform.
She served less than a full term in the Illinois House before Pritzker selected her as his running mate for the 2018 gubernatorial election.
Like her boss, Stratton has cast herself as an energetic fighter against all things Trump, and she’s vowed not to vote to confirm any Trump nominees for the Cabinet or Supreme Court.
But she’s also not necessarily planning to fall in line with the Democratic leadership in Washington; Stratton’s said repeatedly that she would not support Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-New York, for another term as leader of the Senate Democrats. She’s said she wants to help “push” Democrats “to be more courageous” in countering a president she has labeled as a “wannabe dictator.”
She leaned heavily into that anti-Trump messaging, releasing a viral digital ad in the primary that featured supporters, including Duckworth, repeating the tagline, “F— Trump, vote Juliana.”
More specifically, Stratton has condemned the president’s tariff policy and the war with Iran for driving up the cost of living, pledging not to vote for any bills that provide supplemental funding to the war effort.
She’s doubled down on affordability as a priority, promising to raise the federal minimum wage to $25 an hour from $7.25, where it has stood since 2009. She has also vowed to propose a tax cut for middle-income earners, funded by an increase on those making at least $1 million a year.
“I think we should stop thinking about bare minimum — bare minimum wage, bare minimum healthcare,” Stratton told Capitol News Illinois in April. “We should start thinking about how to help people thrive, and that’s what I’m going to fight for.”
Stratton’s healthcare priorities include securing Medicare for All, protecting reproductive healthcare and the right to an abortion, and addressing disparities in Black maternal mortality. Her first run for office was spurred by her firsthand experiences with the American healthcare system while caring for her mother, who had Alzheimer’s disease.
When federal agents shot two people and racked up dozens of misconduct complaints amid the Trump administration’s ‘Operation Midway Blitz’ immigration enforcement campaign last fall, Stratton called for comprehensive immigration reform, including the abolition of Immigration and Customs Enforcement, to be replaced by a new agency housed outside of the Department of Homeland Security.
Former Dem falls short
It was a tough night for once-Democrat turned state GOP chair Tracy, though not an unexpected one; a Republican has not won statewide office in Illinois since 2014. And while he was the only Republican seeking statewide office to run television ads this cycle, Tracy was unable to reverse that legacy.
Like Stratton, Tracy made affordability his top priority on the campaign trail, though he disagreed on how to address it, blaming taxes and spending by Democrats. He also criticized Stratton’s minimum wage proposal, saying it would harm small businesses and increase the cost of living.
An attorney by profession, Tracy started his political career in 2002 as a Democrat, when he unsuccessfully ran for a Springfield-based Illinois Senate seat.
In an interview with Capitol News Illinois in July, Tracy said that he ran as a Democrat because he thought he could be more independent, but through the election, he found out his values aligned more with the Republican Party.
In 2010, he finished third in his lieutenant governor’s run. After his election in 2015, Former Gov. Bruce Rauner, a Republican, appointed Tracy chair of the Illinois Gaming Board, where he served until 2019.
From 2021 to 2024, Tracy was the GOP party chair. Initially, both suburban moderates and state conservatives elected him, but intraparty fighting between the two factions led him to step down.
Congressional races
National pundits didn’t consider Illinois a major player in the battle for control of the U.S. House, largely because it’s an entrenched blue state whose congressional maps were drawn to ensure Democrats safely control 14 of the state’s 17 seats.
The Democratic-drawn maps appear to have worked as planned, with the status quo prevailing for Illinois’ delegation.
Party insiders had at times wondered whether a “blue wave” election could carry underfunded political newcomer Paul Nolley past incumbent Republican Darin LaHood, who represented the wide-ranging 16th District in the Peoria area since 2015.
But by 10 p.m., LaHood had won, as did the other two Republican congressmen, Mike Bost in the 12th District and Mary Miller in the 15th District.
Illinois’ closest two Democratic-held districts were the 17th, held by Congressman Eric Sorensen, and the 13th, held by Nikki Budzinski. Both races were still rated “Solid D” by Cook Political report, and by 10 p.m., Sorensen had won, and Budzinski was comfortably ahead.
For the winners in Illinois’ congressional delegation, see results here:
Capitol News Illinois is a nonprofit, nonpartisan news service that distributes state government coverage to hundreds of news outlets statewide. It is funded primarily by the Illinois Press Foundation and the Robert R. McCormick Foundation.
