Editorial: Illinois GOP needs to seek middle ground
In the summer of 2019, as eager crowds in southern Illinois were attending public forums to hear how Cook County could be pushed out of Illinois and become its own state, a reporter asked the state's GOP leadership how hard the party would back the idea.
The party wouldn't, then-state Republican Party Chairman Tim Schneider and House Minority Leader Jim Durkin said bluntly. If southern Republican legislators got traction from campaigning on splitting the state, good for them, Durkin said, "but we know that that's not a possibility." If the idea ever got serious consideration, he added, it could be very damaging for Illinois.
It was the pragmatic approach. Clearly, GOP leaders didn't want to take their party down the rabbit hole if they could help it.
Alas, Tuesday's election shows just how far down that hole the Illinois Republican Party has gone in the past three years anyway. Their gubernatorial candidate, state Sen. Darren Bailey, is a 2020 election denier who won a six-way primary partly by securing former President Donald Trump's endorsement; Bailey also supported a total ban on abortion, sued Gov. JB Pritzker over his pandemic stay-at-home order and, yes, sponsored legislation to separate Chicago from the rest of Illinois. To no one's surprise, Bailey lost on Tuesday with only 40% of the vote (with 90% counted).
If nothing else, Tuesday's Illinois midterm election should have cemented for the Illinois GOP that unless they embrace moderation, wholeheartedly, they'll never win another meaningful election in this state. Why? Because in recent years they have steadily been losing the suburbs to Democrats, and with Tuesday's results, the transformation is nearly complete. Once the suburbs could be counted on to deliver statewide GOP victories, but not a single statewide official elected Tuesday is Republican - as was the case in 2018. Even the Kane County Board is now majority Democratic.
Moreover, the longer the GOP leadership waits to change course, the longer suburbanites will have to get comfortable with the Democrats they've elected.
This isn't just about setting out a recipe for GOP success; it's about giving voters meaningful choices. Voters in Illinois need options in their elected officials, and the diverse ideas that come with those options. For most suburbanites, the ideas coming from MAGA candidates are just not viable.
At the same time, Illinois Democrats need to be nudged to help the GOP make the transition to rational politics; i.e., stop tossing campaign money at MAGA Republicans and stay out of their opponents' primary. Ultimately, the GOP has to be strong enough to deflect the meddling, but Democrats also need to be strong enough to accept and value opposition truly loyal to the state.
At this moment, the nation appears to be in a sort of existential crisis between the forces of good government and the forces of no government. It's been our defining battle from the beginning, but it feels to be at pivotal point now.
In Illinois, the forces that believe good government can exist seem to have all but vanquished those who think that government is nothing but a necessary evil dominated by selfishness, greed and corruption.
Somehow, Republicans have to reshape the conversation to acknowledge that good government can exist and it needs involvement from the moderating influences Republicans provide. The alternative is to have no influence at all.