By Illinois Review
It wasn’t that long ago when IL GOP leaders were endorsing Fl. Gov. Ron DeSantis’ failed presidential bid, hosting ‘Never Trumpers’ at fundraisers in Naples, Florida; naming anti-MAGA officials as gala co-chairs and blaming President Donald Trump for Illinois election losses in 2020 and 2022.
When Trump secured the Republican nomination for president last Spring, those same officials were silent. But that’s not all. When this publication revealed that a party leader in 2016 compared Donald Trump to Adolf Hitler – IL GOP officials were once again silent.
This pattern, however, should come as no surprise. In 2022, IL GOP officials backed Richard Irvin’s failed campaign for Illinois governor. During the primary campaign, it was reported by WTTW’s Paris Schutz that in 2018, Irvin sent text messages calling Trump an “idiot” and a “bigoted racist.” Irvin also texted the friend, “I hate Trump too!” Irvin would lose the primary to the Trump-endorsed candidate by 43 points.
During Republican Day at the Illinois State Fair last year, then Illinois Republican national committeeman Richard Porter gave an interview to the Chicago Tribune and said that Trump couldn’t win independent voters in swing states in 2024 and that he was running for president to avoid going to jail.
“I think the most ardent Trumpers recognize that they might love him in their heart, but they know in their head he is not going to win independents in Georgia, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Michigan, New Hampshire, Arizona and Nevada. And that’s what you need to do to become president. And if you don’t become president of the United States, Trump goes to jail.”
After this publication ran a story on his reported comments, Porter was in damage control, offering a long explanation to try and repair the damage – but it was too little, too late. And during the 2024 election, Trump would win every swing state proving Porter to be wrong once again.
And former Illinois House Republican leader Jim Durkin – who is revered and respected by IL GOP leaders – likes to blame Trump for every Republican loss in Illinois. In November 2023, Durkin announced that he was not going to run for Cook County State’s Attorney and he blamed President Trump for his decision not to throw his hat in the race.
“I know that if you’re going to run in a race, you have to run knowing that you have a good chance of winning, and I see no path winning with Trump at the top of the ticket [in 2024],” Durkin told CBS Chicago anchor Brad Edwards.
In the Spring of 2022, IL GOP leaders traveled down to Naples, Florida to host a private reception featuring former US Attorney General Bill Baar, who served as AG under the George HW Bush and Donald Trump presidential administrations. Baar remains critical of Trump, and in November of 2022, he published a scathing opinion piece in the New York Post, writing,
“Unless the rest of the party goes along with him, he will burn the whole house down by leading ‘his people’ out of the GOP. Trump’s willingness to destroy the party if he does not get his way is not based on principle, but on his own supreme narcissism. His egoism makes him unable to think of a political party as anything but an extension of himself – a cult of personality.”
During this past election cycle where Trump dominated and made history winning both the popular and electoral votes by historic margins – and Republicans took control of the U.S. Senate and maintained control of the U.S. House – IL GOP leaders once again proved why their support is the ‘kiss of death.’
In District 10, Democrat U.S. Rep. Brad Schneider smoked Republican Jim Carris – who was the darling of the IL GOP, by 20 points – the largest margin of defeat of any congressional candidate. Illinois Republican leaders came out strong for Carris in ways not seen with other pro-MAGA candidates – as Carris had the support of the IL GOP establishment and leaders like IL GOP co-chair Kathy Salvi and national committeeman Dean White. Carris even appeared alongside Turning Point USA founder Charlie Kirk at a private event where the two shared the stage. Carris is pro-choice and refused to vocalize any support of Trump during his failed congressional campaign.
“I’ve done a lot of research on this and studied and really given it a lot of thought and I am a pro-choice candidate,” Carris told a group in Winnetka, Illinois on June 6, 2024. During that same event, Carris refused to offer support for Trump when asked – who at the time was the presumptive Republican nominee for President, saying,
“I am an independent person. I will decide when the time comes, but I’m concerned about my own campaign at this point…rather than be worried about the national election.”
Carris was also endorsed by former U.S. Sen. Mark Kirk (IL), who is a Never Trumper – and called him “one of my political heroes…I can’t tell you how meaningful this is to me.”
During the 2016 national GOP convention, many IL GOP leaders, including then Gov. Rauner, former Gov. Jim Edgar, US Sen. Mark Kirk and Rauner-appointed Comptroller Leslie Munger, skipped the convention because they did not support Trump.
Kirk even ran an ad that said that Trump was not “fit to be Commander in Chief.”
Across Illinois, state Democratic leaders maintained their super majority control as Republicans failed to flip any seats despite this being a historic Republican year with Trump at the top of the ticket. Democrats in the state House maintain the largest majority over Republicans in Illinois history.
So what’s the key takeaway?
IL GOP leaders and their cadre of failed political consultants have proven that like the Chicago Bears – they can find creative ways to lose and snatch defeat out of the jaws of victory.
But what can you expect? It’s in their DNA.
