Joe Berrios—one of the last vestiges of Chicago machine politics who stacked his payroll with relatives and oversaw a vastly unfair property tax system—is out.
“I think that he’s probably going to enjoy his retirement, but he wants to make sure the office is transitioned in a great way,” said Jacob Kaplan, executive director of the Cook County Democratic Party. Even though Fritz Kaegi is the favorite to win and is leading in the results, the election might not be completely resolved tonight, as a third candidate, Andrea Raila, is planning to challenge the results in court.
“We have made history. You have made history. You have decided that the nation is ready to send an immigrant from Durango, Mexico, to Congress,” he said. “We know that we are ready—we have been ready for a long time.”
Kaegi campaigned on a commitment not to take donations from property tax lawyers doing business with the county. His campaign was largely self-funded, though he said that they’d attracted more than 1,000 donors. Kaegi himself gave more than $1.5 million to his campaign.
Though much of the focus has been on Berrios and Kaegi, Raila fought tooth and nail to get on the ballot. She was knocked out of the race for faulty petition signatures after the ballots were already printed. Announcements were made that votes for her would not count. Last week she successfully appealed the ruling and was back to being a candidate in good standing. But confusion persisted as late as Tuesday morning, when the Chicago Board of Elections told some election judges that votes for Raila wouldn’t count. The judges thus passed out some incorrect information to voters. Spokesman Jim Allen later apologized and said that correct instructions were ultimately provided to all poll workers and voters. But as the polls closed Raila’s campaign was already preparing to challenge the results. “What we’re asking for is to stop and suppress all voting for assessor and to have a supplementary or new election just for assessor,” Raila’s attorney Frank Avila told reporters.
