The Democratic Party of Illinois led by Speaker Michael Madigan has started to pour money into an effort to keep Illinois Supreme Court Justice Tom Kilbride on the bench with two weeks until Election Day.
Election records filed Tuesday night showed the Democrats put $550,000 into the Nov. 3 Kilbride retention campaign. That pushes the total political spending by both sides in the contest to nearly $7 million.
The contest is critical for Democrats because a Kilbride loss could jeopardize the party’s 4-3 majority on the state’s high court. With money from billionaire donors, Republicans are waging an anti-Kilbride campaign in hopes of knocking him off the court and getting a chance to capture the open seat in the 2022 election.
On Wednesday, a pair of Republican congressmen criticized the contribution.
“Clearly, Kilbride has been compromised” by the donation Madigan dropped into the justice’s campaign, said Peoria-area U.S. Rep. Darin LaHood, whose sprawling 18th Congressional District overlaps with parts of the Kilbride judicial district.
U.S. Rep. Adam Kinzinger of the neighboring 16th Congressional District said the contribution showed the “panic from Kilbride and Madigan (is) obvious.”
They both noted Kilbride told WBEZ-FM he would not be taking Madigan-related money in the race, saying the justice went back on his word.
To win retention and secure a third 10-year term, Kilbride must be supported by 60% of the voters in a 21-county district that runs from Will and Kankakee on the east to Peoria and Rock Island on the west.
The retention fight is a continuation of Madigan and Democratic forces battling the wealthy Republicans who backed former GOP Gov. Bruce Rauner.
Republican billionaire businessmen Ken Griffin has contributed $2 million to unseat Kilbride, and wealthy GOP donor Richard Uihlein has given $500,000. The anti-Kilbride forces have amassed $2.8 million overall.
Until the Madigan money showed up Tuesday, the Kilbride campaign had received nearly $3.3 million — mostly from trial lawyers and labor unions.
The infusion by Madigan, who is the state Democratic chairman, is aimed at countering the GOP money and fits the speaker’s pattern of backing Kilbride’s candidacy the last two times the justice was on the ballot.
In 2000, Madigan contributed nearly $700,000 in Democratic Party funds late in the campaign to help Kilbride, then a 47-year-old Democratic labor lawyer from Rock Island, win the 3rd Judicial District contest.
It was a major political victory for Madigan, who flipped a Supreme Court seat that Republicans had long held. That temporarily gave Democrats a 5-2 majority on the court. A few years later, Republicans flipped a seat in far southern Illinois, returning the court to the 4-3 Democratic majority that remains today.
In 2010, the speaker sent more than $1 million in party funds into Kilbride’s retention contest for a second 10-year term. Kilbride won, collecting about 65% of the vote.
Campaign finance expert Kent Redfield said Madigan’s move Tuesday indicates that the anti-Kilbride spending is having an impact. Waves of campaign attack mailers and TV ads have focused on linking Kilbride to Madigan in voters’ minds.
Madigan’s decision to pump in big money now may give anti-Kilbride forces even more reason to push the Madigan-Kilbride connection, Redfield said.
For Madigan, “the upside of being able to increase party spending outweighs the downside of the anti-Kilbride people being able to link him more directly to Madigan,” Redfield said.
Twitter @RayLong
