There could
be some loud fireworks the next time the Illinois Senate Democrats meet behind
closed doors.
Two of
those Senate Democrats, Martin Sandoval and Tony Munoz, contributed a combined
$45,000 to Rep. Rich Bradley's losing Democratic primary campaign against Sen.
Iris Martinez. That is a big political no-no.
Martinez
pulled off a stunning upset last week by beating Bradley by nine points. She received
hundreds of thousands of dollars from Senate President Emil Jones, but Rep.
Bradley's precinct organization was supposed to be too tough to beat. In the end, though, Martinez had more
of a field operation than was expected. Her clear superiority on cable TV - and
the fact that she was running positive ads while Bradley could only afford to
go negative on cable - was also a major factor.
The fight
started a year ago when Jones appointed Martinez to his Senate leadership team,
even though the Senate Latinos, including Martinez, had voted to promote Sen.
Munoz. Martinez was warned to reject Jones' offer. She refused. And ever since
Munoz and Sandoval have been voting against pretty much every major bill that
Jones supported. Then, late last year they convinced Bradley to run against
Martinez.
Their
yearlong crusade has obviously not ended well. Munoz and Martinez, along with
some of their allies, succeeded in tying Jones up in knots during last year's
extended legislative session. They thought they could do the same thing to him
at the ballot box. They were wrong.
Complicating
matters further is the fact that the most strident voice in Jones' caucus, Sen.
Rickey Hendon, won by a huge margin last week.
Hendon
consistently argues for ever more party discipline and retribution against
those who dare question Jones. Hendon fended off well-funded attacks by two
opponents and still managed to garner more than 62 percent of the vote.
And then
there was Sen. Willie Delgado's 60-40 win against a hard-charging, well-funded
challenger. Delgado started last year allied with Sandoval and Munoz, but he
eventually switched sides and is now mostly with Jones.
The thing
that brings all of those wins together was the involvement of House members on
the other side. Senate President Jones has been feuding with House Speaker
Michael Madigan for over a year. Madigan repeatedly manipulated Jones' caucus
members against their leader, and Jones has tried to do the same to Madigan.
Their protracted battle has overshadowed almost everything else at the
Statehouse. For the past few months, both men believed that the other was
backing primary challenges against their members.
Rep.
Bradley is a House incumbent, of course, but he also received cash and aid from
several fellow House members, and many of the contributors who lined up with
Bradley are connected to Speaker Madigan.
A ward
organization that backed one of the two Sen. Hendon opponents is run by a House
member (John Fritchey).
The
campaign by Delgado's opponent was run and partially financed by a House member
(Susana Mendoza).
Jones'
forces didn't win everything last week. His former staffer Stanley Moore was
absolutely trounced 75-25 by Rep. Monique Davis. Candidates openly backed by
Sen. Hendon against several of Madigan's incumbents also came up way short.
Still, the
rush from all those other victories, particularly the Martinez win, will at
least temporarily silence some of Jones' fiercest critics within his own
caucus. Those critics have been grumbling about Jones' impending
"losses" for weeks. They had claimed that a Martinez loss, and any
other big defeats, would reflect poorly on Jones' leadership and his judgment.
A Martinez loss could have even forced Jones to retire at the end of his term
because it would have showed that the war he fought with his members was futile
and counter-productive. The governor's massive health insurance expansion
proposal was just one of the bills that didn't pass last year because of the
divisions created by the Martinez war.
Those Jones
wins will also likely embolden those who want to take an even harder line
against the internal critics and up the ante against Speaker Madigan. Unless
cooler heads prevail, last year's year-long, contentious, divisive Statehouse
war might get even worse this year.
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Rich Miller
also publishes Capitol Fax, a daily political newsletter, and
thecapitolfaxblog.com.