As early voting continues in Cook County, the ballot has presented voters with an unusual choice, as a Republican has stepped forward to seek one of the countywide vacancies on the Cook County Circuit Court.
Judicial candidate and city of Chicago administrative hearing officer Tien H. Glaub is running as a Republican in the race to fill the vacancy of Cook County Judge James P. Flannery, following his death in 2023.
In that race, she is opposing Democrat Pablo DeCastro, a Chicago criminal defense lawyer.
Glaub's candidacy is notable, as she becomes the first Republican candidate to seek election to a countywide judgeship in the notoriously Democrat-dominated Cook County since 2010.
At that time, Republican Maureen Masterson Pulia, who had served as a trustee and clerk in the suburban village of Westchester, lost to Democrat Daniel J. Gallagher, receiving 41% of the vote.
In Cook County this year, there are 11 countywide judgeships on the ballot, as well as 29 judgeships in the county's judicial subcircuits.
However, only five of those races are contested in November. All of the other judgeships feature Democrats running unopposed, including many who ran unopposed even in the Democratic Party primary elections earlier this spring.
According to her biography, Glaub is an attorney who works in the city of Chicago's Department of Administrative Hearings as a manager of administrative adjudication. According to her campaign website, she has held that position since October 2020.
Before that, Glaub served in the DOAH as a hearing officer and prosecutor from 2012-2019, handling hearings related to city license appeals and consumer fraud and city ordinance-related vehicle tickets. Her online biography asserts she further assisted the city's Deparment of Law with defending appeals from the DOAH hearings to circuit court.
Glaub did not run in the Republican Party's primary elections in the spring. Rather, she was slated as a candidate by the Cook County Republican Party. Her nominating petitions were submitted June 3 and her candidacy received no objections.
Glaub did not respond to repeated interview requests from the Cook County Record, including declining to answer why she chose to challenge DeCastro for this judicial vacancy in particular.
On her campaign website and Facebook page, Glaub said she is running "to ensure that the judicial power is used adequately to render justice to all parties, especially when Cook County residents do not receive adequate protection against crime."
Glaub said she brings "years of experience to bear on the challenge of upholding the rule of law, ensuring honesty and integrity in process of decision making (sic), and having the courage to do what is right according to the law."
"I hope that my candidacy raises awareness about justice and fairness in the judicial system," Glaub said on her campaign site.
According to her online biography, Glaub is a Vietnamese immigrant who reportedly had "grown up in Vietnam during the War."
According to the Illinois State Bar Association and other legal organizations that evaluate judicial candidates, Glaub did not participate in their candidate evaluation processes. As a result, those organizations said Glaub received a rating of "Not Recommended," which is their default rating for candidates who choose not to participate.
Those same agencies rated Glaub's opponent, DeCastro, as "qualified."
After securing the Democratic nomination this spring, DeCastro was appointed to serve as a Cook County judge by the Illinois Supreme Court. At the time, the state high court said they believed the appointment was proper because no Republican candidate had yet stepped forward to challenge DeCastro and the appointment was needed to address a shortage of judges in Cook County to help handle the county court's caseload.
DeCastro now touts his "experience as a judge" on his campaign website, along with 28 years as a "trial attorney."
"With a career centered around protecting the vulnerable and upholding individual rights, I am confident that my experience uniquely equips me to effectively uphold the principles of justice and fairness as a judge," DeCastro said on his campaign website.
Contested subcircuit races
In the other contested Cook County judicial races, three of those races are in the 12th Judicial Subcircuit, which includes communities of the county's northwest suburbs, including Wheeling, Northbrook, Palatine, and portions of Arlington Heights, Inverness, Rolling Meadows and Barrington, among others.
In those races:
- In the contest for the vacancy of former Cook County Judge Grace Dickler, Republican attorney Maria McCarthy is opposing Democratic attorney Alon Stein. McCarthy, a former career prosecutor within the Cook County State's Attorney's Office and the Winnebago County State's Attorney's Office, is now a partner at the firm of McCarthy & Valentini, where she focuses on work as a special prosecutor on criminal cases in Will County. Stein is the owner of Stein Law Offices, where he focuses on commercial litigation and representation of small to mid-sized businesses.
- In the contest for the vacancy of Judge Marguerite Quinn, Democrat Frank J. Andreou is opposed by Republican Pamela Curran Smith. Andreou has served on the Cook County bench since 2019, when he was appointed as an associate judge. Smith currently serves as an attorney in private practice, with a focus on criminal defense, tort and civil litigation.
- And in the contest for the vacancy of former Judge Andrea M. Schleifer, Republican attorney Matthew Taylor is opposed by Democratic attorney James "Jack" Costello. According to online bios, Taylor is a former Palatine police officer, who now serves as Palatine's village prosecutor. Costello is a career prosecutor within the Cook County State's Attorney's office, currently assigned to that office's Public Corruption/Financial Crimes Unit.
The only other contested judicial race in Cook County is in its 18th Subcircuit, also in Cook County's northwest suburbs, including the communities of Des Plaines, Mount Prospect and Elk Grove Village, among others.
- In the contest for the vacancy of former Judge James Linn, Democratic attorney John Hock is opposing Republican attorney Lynn Terese Palac. According to online bios, Hock worked in Florida in civil litigation until 2009, when he moved to Illinois, working in the offices of the Will County Public Defender and the Lake County Public Defender. Since 2022, he has served in the Cook County State's Attorney's office focusing on post-conviction matters in that office's Special Litigation Unit.
Palac served for 10 years in the Cook County State's Attorney's office until 2009, when she left for private practice. She currently also serves as a supervising attorney for Catholic Charities Legal Assistance, a role in which she represents Catholic Charities in domestic violence cases and other legal matters.
All of the candidates for judicial subcircuit races received ratings of either "Qualified" or "Highly Qualified" from judicial candidate evaluating organizations, except for Palac. The Chicago Bar Association and Chicago Council of Lawyers both rated Palac as "qualified." However, the Illinois State Bar Association rated Palac as "not qualified," expressing concerns "about the depth and breadth of her litigation experience since leaving the State’s Attorney’s Office in 2009."