There’s another federal election today, the little-noticed special House election in Chicago to replace Rahm Emanuel, who departed Congress to become White House chief of staff.
It’s a heavily Democratic district, with Emanuel carrying more than 73 percent of the vote in 2008. Today’s election pits Democratic nominee Michael Quigley against Republican nominee Rosanna Pulido and Green Party nominee Matt Reichel.
A Chicago reader writes in:
New IL-05 resident here. An hour in, I was the #3 voter in my precinct. There has been zero coverage of this election. It’s actually amusing. The Democratic primary was heated and well-covered. Now, the general is basically defaulted. Not saying that Pulido stands a chance here, but just that the extremely low turnout might make things interesting, one way or another.
Given that Quigley was probably the best possible Dem choice, I can’t be too upset.
UPDATE: Another Chicago reader writes in, with a similar tale. I can’t urge any Republican to get their hopes too high, as a GOP win would be a stunning upset. But it’s interesting to hear how low turnout is, and maybe that will make this race much closer than anyone figured . . .
My wife and I voted for Pulido this morning (about 7 am). We were voters 4 and 5 in our precinct. By my count thats at least 3 votes for Pulido. Maybe we could win this win after all. As with the previous reader, I haven’t heard much about this election since the primary. I believe a local channel had a debate (WTTW), but I hadn’t seen much in the papers. The only signs I saw in the area were for Pulido (granted I live in a more upscale area of the city). I also received two robocalls over the past two days for Pulido. Not sure if any of this translates into a upset, but hopefully with a good showing the IL Repubs can pick themselves up off of the floor.