Robin Kelly enters U.S. Senate primary

U.S. Rep. Robin Kelly has joined the field if Democrats hoping to replace Dick Durbin in the U.S. Senate.

“You could say I’ve been an underdog all my life,” Kelly said in a video that describes her victory over a longtime incumbent for state representative in 2002 and her fight to reduce gun violence.

After the 2012 mass shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Connecticut, “I ran for Congress to make communities safer. We took on the machine and the NRA and won.”

In her first term in Congress, the south suburban Democrat refused to stand for moment of silence after a mass shooting saying it was a futile gesture without action.

“Moments of silence just aren’t going to cut it anymore,” she said.

Kelly joins Lt. Gov. Juliana Stratton in what’s likely to be a tough primary.

Others expected to join the fray are Democratic U.S. Reps. Raja Krishnamoorthi of Schaumburg and Lauren Underwood of Naperville.

Potential Republican candidates include former Lake County sheriff Mark Curran, U.S. Rep. Darin LaHood of Peoria, and former Illinois National Committeeman Richard Porter of Northfield.

Kelly criticized President Donald Trump, Elon Musk and Congressional Republicans as “targeting Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security, and passing policies that raise costs for Illinois families, small businesses, and farmers.”

“Our situation is a whole different moment. That’s why I’m running for U.S. Senate to fight for health care that doesn’t bankrupt families, for wages that lift people up, for housing that’s affordable, for neighborhoods safe from gun violence.”

Kelly, a former mental health counselor, grew up in New York where her parents ran a small business. She moved to Illinois to attend Bradley University in Peoria and has a doctorate in political science from Northern Illinois University.

The mother of two adult children lives in Lynwood.