A Cook County election board has refused the attempt by Democrats to kick a Republican candidate for state representative from the ballot, rejecting arguments from a top Illinois Democratic election lawyer that a new Illinois ballot access law passed in May should block the candidate from the ballot, even though a Springfield judge said that law could not be constitutionally enforced against candidates in 2024.
On Aug. 27, the Cook County Electoral Board voted 3-0 to overrule an objection to the candidacy of Ron Andermann, the Republican nominee for the seat from the Illinois 53rd House District.
The decision means Andermann will officially advance to face unelected interim State Rep. Nicolle Grasse in the November election for that seat.
Ronald Andermann
| Wheeling Township Republican Party
Grasse, a former Arlington Heights village trustee, was appointed by Cook County Democratic Party leaders this spring to serve the remainder of the term of former State Rep. Mark Walker.
Walker, also a Democrat, had first been appointed by Democratic Party leaders to replace former State Sen. Ann Gillespie in the 27th Legislative (State Senate) District.
Gillespie resigned that seat when she was appointed by Democratic Gov. JB Pritzker to lead the state's Department of Insurance.
Andermann had filed his nominating petitions with the Illinois State Board of Elections to place his name on the ballot as the Republican candidate challenging Grasse on June 3.
However, Andermann's candidacy and those of about a dozen other Republican candidates were jeopardized before they even began by a new Illinois state law enacted by the state's Democratic legislative supermajority in an apparent bid to prevent Republicans from challenging some Democratic legislative candidates and incumbents this fall.
Under that law, initially known as SB2412, state lawmakers rewrote the state's election rules on the fly to block political parties from selecting nominess to run for state legislative seats after the spring primary election, unless they had first run in their party's primary.
Under the previous rules, parties who had no official nominees following the primary election had 75 days following that balloting to "slate" candidates to run as the official party candidate in those races. This year, that deadline was June 3.
However, six weeks after the March 19 primary, and with just about four weeks until the June 3 deadline, Democrats rushed SB2412 through both houses of the Illinois General Assembly in less than 48 hours. It was then quickly signed by Pritzker and took effect immediately, upending the candidate nomination process already underway.
While the changes would apply to all political parties, Republicans and other observers said the driving force behind the law appeared to be a brazen move by Democrats to protect incumbents and prevent at least certain Republicans from potentially claiming seats in more politically divided districts.
Democrats, including Pritzker, said the law was needed to ensure party nominees were chosen democratically by voters and not by party leaders. The law, however, did not address the practice of party bosses appointing state lawmakers, like Grasse, to replace incumbent lawmakers who either are appointed to other seats or otherwise resign, even within weeks or days of an election.
The Democrats also repeated those assertions in court, even as Democratic bosses, including Pritzker and Illinois House Speaker Emanuel "Chris" Welch rushed to applaud the selection of Vice President Kamala Harris to replace President Joe Biden as the Democratic nominee for president of the United States, even though Harris was selected by party insiders and never won any presidential primary election in 2020 or 2024.
The law was challenged promptly in court by a group of Republican state legislative candidates, including Andermann, through the Liberty Justice Center in Chicago. They asserted the law was an unconstitutional attempt to change the election rules in the middle of an election cycle, trampling the rights of voters and candidates alike.
In Sangamon County Circuit Court in Springfield, Judge Gail Noll sided with the challengers, and barred Illinois state election authorities, specifically, from using the law to deny the Republican candidates their places on the ballot. She agreed the law was unconstitutional, as applied to those particular candidates.
Democratic Illinois House Speaker Emanuel "Chris" Welch then appealed that decision to the Illinois Supreme Court.
However, the Democrat-dominated state high court deadlocked, after two justices, P. Scott Neville and Joy V. Cunningham - both Chicago Democrats - recused themselves from taking part in hearing the case. The Illinois Supreme Court did not provide a reason for their recusal.
Effectively, that meant Noll's ruling stood.
Despite that ruling, however, Democrats still attempted to remove Andermann from the ballot.
After Andermann filed his nominating petitions in June, his candidacy was challenged under an official objection filed by Janice Phares, an Arlington Heights resident who is active in local Democratic Party politics in the northwest suburbs, including the Greater Palatine Area Democrats, according to online sources.
The 53rd House District includes portions of southern Arlington Heights, Rolling Meadows, Mt. Prospect and other communities in Cook County's northwest suburbs.
In the objection, Phares claimed SB2412's "anti-slating" provisions should mean Andermann should be kicked off the ballot, even after Noll's ruling.
Phares was represented by attorney Michael J. Kasper, a prominent Illinois Democratic election lawyer with deep ties to party leadership, including indicted former House Speaker Michael J. Madigan. Kasper also represented Welch before both Judge Noll and the Illinois Supreme Court in the challenge to SB2412.
The objection was filed before the Cook County Electoral Board, a three-member body that includes representatives of the offices of the Cook County Clerk, Cook County State's Attorney and Cook County Clerk of the Circuit Court.
Even though Andermann, as a candidate for state office, is required to file his nominating petitions with the Illinois State Board of Elections, the Cook County Electoral Board is designated by state law as the body to handle objections to his candidacy because the 53rd Representative District lies entirely within Cook County.
Following a hearing earlier this summer, a hearing officer for the Cook County Electoral Board submitted a report to the full board, recommending they ignore Judge Noll's ruling and reject Andermann's candidacy.
That report and recommendation were filed Aug. 21, a day before the Illinois Supreme Court said it could not overturn Noll's ruling.
The hearing officer was not identified on the Cook County Electoral Board's website.
On Aug. 27, the Cook County Electoral Board rejected the hearing officer's recommendation and said they believed they should honor Noll's ruling.
"This Electoral Board finds that while the law is clear that Electoral Boards do not have the authority to find a statute unconstitutional, the unique circumstances in this case allow the Electoral Board to follow the effective affirmance of the Sangamon County Circuit Court Order," the Electoral Board wrote in its decision.
"... While the injunctive provision of that order applied to the State Board of Elections and its members as defendants, the court also granted declaratory judgment to the plaintiffs, including candidate Andermann, declaring as a matter of law that Public Act 103-586 (SB2412) as applied to all plaintiffs violated their constitutional right to access the ballot...
"Therefore the Sangamon County Circuit Court decision declaring the application of this statutory amendment to the candidacy of this Plaintiff to be unconstitutional as applied will be followed by this Electoral Board."
Andermann applauded the Cook County Electoral Board's decision not to challenge Noll's ruling and blasted Democrats for attempting to ignore the judge to protect Grasse in November.
"The DNC in Chicago has ended, but in Illinois the Democratic threat to democracy continued," Andermann said. "The Democrat’s own 'Project 2024,' the unpublished manifesto of no election but instead party boss selection, is in full gear. In spite of the Illinois Supreme Court decision affirming the unconstitutionality of a new election interference law, Democrats tripled down and tried to eliminate me from the ballot one more time.
"Today the voters won. They will have one more choice in the coming election in spite of relentless Democrat efforts to remove this candidate from the ballot and have a selected candidate voters have never voted for run unopposed."
Phares and Democrats could still continue their efforts to remove Andermann from the ballot by challenging the Cook County Electoral Board's decision in court.
Andermann has been represented before the Electoral Board by attorney John Fogarty, of Chicago.