February 19, 2020

MARTWICK HAS THE MONEY, MANPOWER TO BEAT O'TOOLE IN 10TH DISTRICT

ANALYSIS & OPINION BY RUSS STEWART

"I calls em' like I sees em'" and it looks to me that Robert Martwick will beat Danny O'Toole in the 10th Illinois Senate District Democratic primary on March 17 for several reasons.

First, Martwick has a ton of cash and will likely spend $300,000 to O'Toole's $30,000. Second, Martwick will have ten mailings to O'Toole's two. And third, I doubt that O'Toole will win the more conservative 41st Ward by more than the 70 percent he needs to prevail district wide. Martwick will prevail 60/40.

Martwick, elected state representative in 2012 in the 19th Illinois House District, which is the east half of the senate district (east of Nagle), engineered his appointment as John Mulroe's replacement last summer. He has money, manpower and endorsements. He also has detractors.

"He's a socialist," quipped 41st Ward Democratic committeeperson Tim Heneghan, who Martwick aced out of the job and is backing O'Toole, a Chicago police sergeant. Heneghan is not seeking re-election.

A major flap erupted when the city's police union, Lodge 7 of the Fraternal Order of Police (FOP), endorsed Martwick over O'Toole, a decorated police officer who was shot in the line of duty and is a former U.S. Marine.

"I am 100 percent pro-police," emphasized Martwick, who said the state FOP endorsed him this year, as it has in past races.

But then the FOP Lodge 7 quickly rescinded its decision, deeming that both Martwick and O'Toole are "highly qualified." That "really angered and galvanized (the police vote) for O'Toole" in the district, said retired CPD lieutenant Mike Byrne, a close associate of Alderman Anthony Napolitano (41st), who has endorsed O'Toole. The alderman, a retired cop now on-leave as a firefighter, beat Heneghan with 70 percent in 2019, endorsed retired CPD lieutenant Bill Kilroy for 41st Ward Democratic committeeperson and police sergeant Ammie Kessem for Republican committeeperson. Kessem lost 21,389-13,852 to Martwick in 2018 in the 19th District. Heneghan has endorsed Joe Cook as his successor.

That created another flap because the current 41st Ward Republican committeeperson is former state Representative Mike McAuliffe (1996-2019), who resigned last summer and handed-off his job to Rosemont Mayor Brad Stephens, who earns $260,000 annually from his day job, and now $60,000 from his Springfield job.

"I am running" (for committeeperson) to help elect Stephens," said McAuliffe. Stephens faces a potentially serious general election competition from Michelle Darbro, a firefighter/EMT who has gotten hefty funding from Speaker Mike Madigan amounting to over $100,000, and faces a primary against Cary Capparelli. She has had three mailings thus far, with ten planned.

McAuliffe's priority is that he needs his 41st Ward Republican base, which was 4,576 in 2016 when he was re-elected unopposed, to stay put. President Trump got 11,480 votes in the ward in the election. O'Toole, conversely, needs a thousand-plus Republican cross-overs - voters who don't need to support President Trump in the Republican primary and can take a Democratic ballot to vote against State's Attorney Kim Foxx for re-nomination and for the local COP SLATE, which includes O'Toole, Kilroy, John Garrido for judge, Joe Duplechin for 19th District state representative, and firefighter/ Alderman Jim Gardiner for 45th Ward Democratic committeeperson.

Not surprisingly there are a lot ill feelings by the McAuliffe/Stephens crowd toward Napolitano, who faces re-election in 2023. Rumors are already circulating that McAuliffe may run, and it is a certainty that Cook, if he defeats Kilroy, will run.

There were 31,000 Democrats who voted in 2016, when Mulroe was unopposed. There are 32,000 households in the 10th District. It costs 65 cents per mailing per household according to Martwick, who has his own direct mail company, an amount that includes printing and postage. That amounts to $32,000-a pop.

Martwick is from Norridge, where his eponymous father was Democratic committeeman from the 1960s onward. Before and during law school Martwick was making $1,000-a month as a Village of Norridge and then Norwood Park Township trustee. He lost bids in 1996 for state senator and 2002 for county commissioner. Martwick was in Madigan's mind when he remapped Illinois House districts in 2011, insuring that Norridge precincts where Martwick resided were included in the 45th/38th Ward 19th District.

While the Northwest Side may be a bastion of cops and first responders, it also has a sizeable liberal/progressive base. Kim Foxx received 3,455 votes in the 41st Ward 2016 Alvarez-Foxx state's attorney primary and Bernie Sanders got 6,757 votes in the presidential primary. The likelihood is that O'Toole will not get his necessary 70 percent.

There is a lot of anti-Trump animosity, said Martwick, who is out in the field every day but knocking on the doors of "hard D's," meaning those households who have voted in two or more recent Democratic primaries. "They want Trump out," he said. Martwick's contact rate is normal, around 20 percent of voting households who open doors, and his approach is to ask, "What's bothering you?" The feedback is Trump, although Martwick is more than willing to talk about taxes, education, pensions and revenue. Martwick is a big champion of the "Fair Tax" constitutional amendment on the November ballot, and was the sponsor of a bill for an elected Chicago school board.

Martwick acknowledges that he is an unknown quantity, especially west of Nagle. The 41st Ward has 43 Ward precincts in the district, with another 43 in the suburbs, which includes Norridge, Harwood Heights, Rosemont and parts of Park Ridge, Des Plaines, Franklin Park and Schiller Park. O'Toole has a spotty ground game in the 41st Ward, but the suburbs - about a quarter of the district - will only be blanketed by direct mail, which Martwick is doing. Martwick has been endorsed by numerous trade unions, CTU, SEIU and pro-choice groups.

Meanwhile, the Chicago Tribune has recently endorsed O'Toole, saying that he appeals to a more moderate, independent brand of Democratic voters. The Trib also had a problem with Martwick filing a bill last year that would have made the Cook County assessor job an appointed position and not an elected one. Martwick supported Joe Berrios over Fritz Kaegi.

O'Toole is running an unabashed conservative campaign, stating that Illinois' fiscal problems are not a lack of tax revenues, but of over-spending.

"We cannot spend what we won't have," he said. O'Toole opposes the so-called "Fair Tax" amendment, which he said will hike corporate taxes to above 15 percent, which will be passed along to consumers. He is also pro-life. "We need somebody different" in Springfield, he said.

My prediction: In a 31,000 turnout, Martwick will win 19,000-12,000.

IN A RELATED development, Oak Park's state senator Don Harmon was elected Senate President to replace the resigned John Cullerton.

He is a white male liberal, but the choice was more about practicality than identity.

Majority leader Kim Lightford and senator Elgie Sims, both African-Americans, wanted the job, and there was a push to elect a women. But the result, as Martwick explained, was "politics over policy." Job One of the Democratic Senate president is to preserve the party's 40-19 majority. Harmon is a voracious fundraiser, and has the proven track record of getting money, which is needed to re-elect Democratic senators. Lightford had no such track record.