Tom Kacich: Low turnout for primary -- but it's been worse

Mar. 24—Submit a Letter to the Editor here

Phew, the 2024 primary election in Champaign County was a stinker. But it could have been worse.

Voter turnout is now calculated at 16 percent (17,302 votes cast of 107,925 active registered voters), but could get to around 20 percent once the about 5,000 outstanding vote-by-mail ballots are counted and the results are certified April 2.

That's low but expected, given the lack of contested races in both parties. The lowest primary turnout in Champaign County in recent years was 13 percent in 1998. The lowest in a recent presidential primary year was 2012's 21 percent — a year when Barack Obama was running unopposed for a second term and the main Republican presidential candidates were Mitt Romney, Rick Santorum, Ron Paul and Newt Gingrich.

For most voters in Champaign County this year, there were few compelling reasons to fill out a ballot: a two-way race for coroner among Democrats, and a choice among about half the Republicans in the county between two underfunded candidates running in the 13th Congressional District. GOP voters in eight of the county's 118 precincts also had a contest between three declared write-in candidates in the 102nd Illinois House District.

At the top of both tickets were the names of two unpopular presidential candidates. Early returns show that about 14 percent of Champaign County Democrats don't want Joe Biden as their standard-bearer in November. Those Democratic voters either wrote in a name, voted for one of three other minor candidates on the ballot or didn't vote for president.

Donald Trump fared even worse among Republican voters in Champaign County. Early, unofficial returns show that Trump got 73 percent of the vote among the county's Republicans — but that doesn't count all those who voted for another candidate, wrote in a name or simply passed over the presidential election. Take those factors into account, and nearly 28 percent of GOP voters indicated they want someone else at the top of their ticket.

Trump lost a handful of precincts in Champaign-Urbana to Nikki Haley (who dropped out of the presidential race March 6) including City of Champaign 20, located just north of the Champaign Country Club.

As usual, Trump did much better in the areas outside of Champaign-Urbana — he got 97 percent of the Republican vote in the Compromise Penfield precinct in the county's northeastern quadrant — but the great majority of the county's votes are in Champaign-Urbana. And once again, Democratic voters outnumbered Republicans in every one of the 62 Champaign-Urbana precincts.

Overall, Democrats made up 55 percent of the county's primary voters, a number that is sure to increase with the late vote-by-mail ballots that always break Democratic. About two-thirds of the vote-by-mail ballots counted Tuesday night were from Democrats.

That so many voted in Champaign County is remarkable, given the lack of competitive contests and the unpopularity of the two presidential candidates. It doesn't bode well for a healthy general election turnout, however, particularly if local Republicans don't find candidates for state's attorney, county auditor and circuit court clerk, as well as representative for the 103rd Illinois House District.

Other primary election items of interest:

— Jim Acklin's effort to win the 102nd Illinois House district seat seems to have fallen short.

The interim village president of Ogden and retired superintendent of the St. Joseph-Ogden school district attempted a write-in campaign for the Republican nomination. But incomplete, unofficial returns show he is being swamped by incumbent Rep. Adam Niemerg of Dieterich, who also ran as a write-in after his candidate petitions were deemed incomplete.

Many counties still haven't reported complete returns, but in those that have, Niemerg is the runaway victor: in Coles County, it was 329-28 in favor of Niemerg; in Effingham County, 472-7; in Crawford County, 1,319 for Niemerg, 106 for Acklin and three for Edward Blade.

In Jasper County, where Acklin did not file as a write-in, Niemerg got all 1,239 votes.

Acklin did win Douglas County, 9-0, but that can't make up for other counties like Cumberland where Niemerg had 906 write-in votes to 49 for Acklin.

— State Rep. Brad Halbrook, R-Shelbyville, easily defeated challenger Marsha Webb of Macon by about 62 percent to 32 percent in the 107th Illinois House District. Webb ran against Halbrook based on his broken promise to limit himself to five terms in the House. Ironically, both candidates seem to have lost in their home counties. Halbrook lost in Shelby County and Webb lost in Macon County.

— The 13th Congressional District Republican primary went to Joshua Loyd of Virden, who scored a surprisingly decisive 56-44 percent win over Thomas Clatterbuck of Champaign. Loyd won all seven counties in the district, including Champaign County, where Loyd unofficially has about 56 percent of the vote.

Loyd will face first-term Democrat Nikki Budzinski of Springfield in the general election. Within 12 hours of the end of voting, the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee issued a statement calling Loyd "unqualified, inexperienced and out of touch."

— Next up for local political parties: choosing a county chairman.

Mike Ingram, former Champaign County board member and former recorder of deeds who had to relinquish the Democratic Party chairmanship after moving to a different precinct, said he's again interested in running for chairman when the party convention is held April 17.

"My plan is to run for chair," Ingram said this week. "I'm not ruling out that things could change. It wouldn't be the first time that something I was planning to do changed based on new information."

Current county Republican Party Chair Jim McGuire said this week that he wants to "have an open contest for our party leadership" including the offices of chair, vice chair, secretary and treasurer, although he did not rule out returning as chair.

"I think more people will want to serve if they feel like they have an opportunity to move up or run for office," McGuire said. "We have a growing party organization working to identify turnout voters with a battle plan to turn Champaign County red."

In Tuesday's voting, however, Democrats elected 53 precinct committeepeople while Republicans elected 40.