Dick Durbin‘s Senate seat is up for grabs and some of Illinois top political figures are vying to fill the vacancy. Last night, three candidates hoping for the Democratic nomination went head to head in a public debate — and our friend Lynn Sweet was there to capture it all.
Sweet reports her observations and takeaways from last night’s debate back to Jen. From ICE taking center stage, to criticism for corporate PAC donations, the will of the voters is emerging with surprising clarity. The pair assess what is at stake with this Senate election, why it is challenging to report on legislative policy, and how slogans can clash with public policy.
Lynn Sweet is the Chicago Sun-Times’ special correspondent for Chicago Public Media, and was previously their Washington Bureau Chief. She appears frequently on CNN & other outlets as an analyst and previously worked at the late PoliticsDaily.
Jen Rubin
Hi, this is Jen Rubin, Inter-in-Chief of The Contrarian. We are thrilled to have back with us Lynn Sweet from Chicago and the Sun Times. Welcome!
Lynn Sweet
Hi, good to be… good to be with you today on this, frigid day in Chicago.
Jen Rubin
Exactly, and we’re getting just a taste of what Chicago lives with for many, many months. There was a Senate debate, and as many of our readers know, and you know all too well, it’s a crowded field. What happened in the debate, and were you surprised how much of it centered on immigration, ICE, And the goings on.
Lynn Sweet
Well, I was actually there, I was in the audience. This was a debate hosted by the Chicago Sun-Times, our partner WBEZ, and the University Chicago Institute of Politics, of which I’m a proud former fellow. So it’s great to be back on campus. And here’s our headline, to your point of of the focus on immigration and ICE, This was a debate with the three frontrunners, Roger Krishnamurti and Robin Kelly, who are members of Congress, and Juliana Stratton, who is the Lieutenant Governor under Governor J.B. Pritzker. And this was mostly on… well, I would say entirely on domestic matters. International matters did not come up. And on the question of ICE, it… and the reason that we have the headline, Trading Fire on Ice, is that it came up early in the debate where Juliana… Juliana went on the attack. And came out swinging against Raja. kind of leaving Robin Kelly, who’s running, third in polls, and these are their top three, knowing she went in knowing that she had to make some inroads in Raja. Her campaign, in my analysis, believes that Raja has hit his ceiling. So she had to do something to prevent him from gaining. Also, to set the stage, Raja has been on cam- on TV around Illinois relentlessly with his giant campaign funds to, mainly talk about what he claims are his accomplishments, and his bio spot Juliana Stratton is on TV in the form of an independent expenditure committee, run by close allies of Governor Pritzker. Having said that, the thing that she hit Raja on is that, she said early on, well, he voted to thank ICE. you know, and why she, you know, why she supports support, abolishing ICE. So, abolishing ICE is, is a slogan. And it’s… there’s a lot of complex stuff on it, going on, and when you look at the… the problems in Chicago, they were mainly created in the… in… in the last… chapters here by Border Patrol. Which is not ICE. So, you know, these slogans, defund the police, become popular, but they aren’t always as helpful in figuring out public policy, but boy, are they potent politically.
Jen Rubin
Absolutely. Now, the thank you that he sent was not recently, and it was part of a larger measure. What was his defense to this?
Lynn Sweet
I only brought that up later in the game, because all three candidates, say that ICE is unacceptable, and then he talked about how he tried to hold ICE accountable, which every Democrat is trying to do. So, in the measure where he was attacked for voting to support, to thank ICE, It took a while for him to get to it, but he did point out that that was a small portion of a bill that… or it was a resolution or a bill, I have to… I forget, but it was a piece of legislation with a recorded vote that was mainly designed to give sympathy to the victims of the massacre, the Jewish victims. of a Jewish-targeted massacre in Colorado. There were four members of the Illinois delegation who voted for it. Most Democrats didn’t, because, you know, but so the ICE provision in it. And that’s why everyone who’s listening, it’s so hard and complex to cover, and to deal with legislative claims in any legislative body, because life doesn’t give you the luxury of purity. And these bills have things in it that you don’t like, and you often just have to choose which one’s more important. And, the Republicans, who… I believe it was Republicans who put in the thank ICE thing, and it was… it’s just part of the bartering you have to do to get even something called on the floor, so the Republicans control what gets voted on. And, Raja gave an impassioned discussion on how he was, you know, asked by Jewish groups to vote for this. So, when you hear the whole context of it, And when you realize that this was… symbolic. It didn’t have any… you know, the language dealing with ICE had no function. It didn’t take away funding, it didn’t handcuff them in their powers, it was… it was just words. And so, which constituency do you want to deal with, Jen? You, you know, you pick and choose, and now he’s getting beat up for it. But the other thing that he eventually was able to articulate, and Robin Kelly too. They all… everybody thinks that what ICE has been doing is wrong, and it gets conflated with what Gregory Bovino and his Border Patrol people have been doing, but there are functions that you want. That’s why the Defund the Police slogan backfired on Democrats, in my analysis, is that, do you really don’t want a cop around? When you… when you call 911 at night, you really gotta think this through, but you know, it’s hard, and then you get beat up on it. The other thing that Juliana Stratton did was beat up Raja for having, you know, he has just raised by far the most of any of them, and he has taken money from sources to find his MAGA donors. And he, he returned some of it, and he… he didn’t handle this as well as he could have, because he said he gave the money back, and he had to kind of be pushed and pushed in the scrum after the debate. Who… he said he gave it to immigration groups, but who? He was real hesitant to name them, and finally he named them, but, she has been hitting… Stratton’s main strategy seems to be dealing with campaign finance, and they must have polling or some evidence that hitting… that voters care about who your donors are. Because that’s the other Achilles heel that Robin Kelly has, and, you know, she was sent in the debate for taking money from corporate PACs, and she said, yes, I did. Which, actually, you know, Jen, when you just say the reality, it’s well documented, well, then you kind of just, oh, okay, she said it, and she does. And, you know, Stratton made a big deal that she’s not taking PAC money. And when you say it that way, it makes it look like she doesn’t have what everybody knows is, and will, come out, the support of what will probably be a very well-funded, independent expenditure group.
Jen Rubin
So-called dark money, yeah.
Lynn Sweet
But no, actually, no, dark… let me… so Raja called it dark money. I double-checked this morning with the group. It will disclose January 31st, so by definition. It’s not dark money. Roger used that in the debate. And, you know, I, and I reacted this way as a one-woman focus group who’s not doing the day-to-day, minute-to-minute coverage. I hadn’t researched how this entity, this, this, committee is, is, is organized, and it wasn’t until in the scrum following up that it came out, they’re going to disclose. So, you know, it’s whatever, but everybody agrees that you want to… you know, Robin Kelly made a point that she’s leading the impeached Dr. Christy Noem, movement in the house.
Jen Rubin
Yes.
Lynn Sweet
And Raja said he co-signed it as a co-sponsor. So, you know, Kelly.
Jen Rubin
All of them want to dismantle Irkank ICE and Border Patrol, and…
Lynn Sweet
That just came up a lot. But when you, what didn’t happen, I thought Raja and Kelly kind of tried to gang up on Juliana. I don’t think they did it, because they weren’t able to do more than just say she’s taking dark money, which is not technically right.
Jen Rubin
So, a couple of points here. there’s the old adage in politics that when you’re explaining, you’re losing. So even if the, accusation is a little bit off-base, or doesn’t quite have the context, you don’t want to be spending your time saying, I didn’t, or, you know, here’s my explanation for that. You got it. That’s, you know, one issue. Second issue, you’re right, I guess there must be some polling, but I find it hard in this day and age to believe that Chicago voters, we’re talking, essentially, Chicago voters. are so naive as to think that everyone doesn’t take some PAC money or have an independent, expenditure. Is that really something that motivates voters in your mind?
Lynn Sweet
This independent expenditure group is run by Quentin Foulkes, who was Pritzker’s former campaign manager. He worked in Kamala Harris’ campaign. The spokesman is Pritzker’s former press, you know, comms chief. And one thing I think they do know polling, and so an analysis is that they’re doing this because they believe that this resonates with voters. When I walked into… outside of the Institute of Politics’ Sun Times BEZ debate last night at the International House on the campus, there was a mobile billboard by Juliana Stratton’s campaign. that hit Raj on taking MAGA money. There’s that IE is doing a MAGA money spot, and lo and behold, it just kind of forecasts what was to come up early in the debate, which was hitting him on MAGA money. And I think that, you know, this came out you know, these are the two overwhelming things about the debate. They had an interesting thing there. You know, Rahm Emanuel, who’s running for president, or testing the waters, came out with a proposal for age limits, and they were asked about that, and none of them said, absolutely. they all kind of said it’s not about age. Robin Kelly talked about, well. you know, look at Pelosi, and Bernie Sanders, and Jim Clyburn. Look at the work that they do, not the age, though it was an interesting thought Robin Kelly thought we should put, if we’re going to have an age limit, let’s do it on the Supreme Court.
Jen Rubin
Right.
Lynn Sweet
So, given everything on this debate, and given the lack of, foreign affairs in it, where I think they do have differences, dealing with, especially, how… how the U.S. role in the Gaza war. There’s another debate this Thursday, and there’s So I think there’s 6 more forms for this week coming up, where there will be time to see how they, you know, how they fine-tune what the message is. And, what they do… Robin Kelly’s campaign told me that they’re going to be coming out on TV pretty soon, they haven’t yet. And on January 31, we’ll know what all these year-end reports were for the campaign.
Jen Rubin
I have the money.
Lynn Sweet
It’s gonna show that Roger has millions and millions more.
Jen Rubin
Right.
Lynn Sweet
And Julian is correct.
Jen Rubin
That’s interesting, the degree to which, if we took the conversation in one of those word bubbles, a month ago, it would have been affordability, affordability, affordability. And, for obvious reasons, the conversation on the Democratic side has shifted so heavily that now there’s kind of one upsmanship to show how strong you’re going to be on dismantling, reforming, reducing ICE slash Border Patrol. It is also interesting that what used to be a very far left position, and if you remember, the candidate at the time, for, senator, in Minnesota, was, Michaela Barnes was kind of smeared for having once suggested that ice needed to be dismantled. is now sort of the main, you know, sort of the center-left mainstream position, although they’re wrestling with what that really means. Does it really mean, you know, dismantle any kind of border system? No, that’s not what they’re talking about. And of course, you have now conservatives saying, well, we never liked DHS, which is this hodgepodge of agencies. Anyway, it’s too bureaucratic, too big, you put all these things together, and it never made very much sense. So there’s a lot… it’s a common… it’s a popular thing to say, but what do you mean by it is, as you said.
Lynn Sweet
the next challenge. It’s also in the eyes of the beholder. You know, you and I were around when DHS was created in the wake of the 9-11 attacks, where the lack of coordination between agencies, was believed to have… been a contributing factor to the U.S. being blindsided By what happened. I don’t know why that meant that FEMA had to be in there, you know, in hindsight. So… the slogan and the substance are kind of here and here, but we’ll know a little more, you know, as we speak, we don’t know if there are enough Senate Democrats that are going to vote on a package to keep government open that will include funding for ICE. I think enough have said no. that it may not pass, and I don’t know if we’re heading towards another partial… I think right now that, yeah, I think there’s probably going to be no vote… Democrats who vote for funding it at this point, so, yes. So, boom, you know, so the discussion continues, but let’s also get to the bottom line of why this is happening. Two people died. in Minnesota. And on this one, Ugh. You know, since so much of what ICE seems to be doing, and Border Patrol has been based on racial profiling.
Jen Rubin
Yes.
Lynn Sweet
or their talk, well, we did it, but so-and-so has a warrant out, or so-and-so drove 10, you know, had a DWI. In this case. You had two… Minnesotans who were white, Who were people that, had clean records, did nothing wrong, could have fit in in a protest in any liberal community in the country, you know, Evanson, Oak Park, Chicago, and all they did, you know, they… May not, and, you know, and they did nothing close.
Jen Rubin
Yes.
Lynn Sweet
Reserve being shot. Right. And so you have… In the second case, Aaron, in Pecky’s case. You know, the other thing why we’re seeing, finally, Republicans speak out.
Jen Rubin
It’s good.
Lynn Sweet
because we had… we had the sad, but I guess, necessary intersection to finally have Republicans say, whoa, and that is. He was carrying a lawfully carrying a weapon.
Jen Rubin
Exactly.
Lynn Sweet
And as some kind… this is not my original thought, you know, Kyle Rittenhouse? the guy who got off the hook for the shooting in Kenosha. Right. How many years have we covered the NRA fighting to the max of the right for your concealed carry, or your right to…
Jen Rubin
Exactly.
Lynn Sweet
item. You don’t need an excuse. You could walk out to go to the grocery store, and if you want to carry your sidearm lawfully in a state that allows it. You can do it. And so now, and maybe this led to Bovino’s being replaced. You… and Christy Noem not knowing that you have awakened the sleeping giant of NRA.
Jen Rubin
Exactly.
Lynn Sweet
We’re down on this guy because he brought a weapon to a protest? I’m sorry, if you could bring a weapon to this grocery market, yeah. And, and that was… I, I, I… and you and I may violently agree on this one, oh, this is what it took. to find.
Jen Rubin
Right.
Lynn Sweet
No, you, you had…
Jen Rubin
Exactly.
Lynn Sweet
You had the killings of two people who have absolutely pristine profiles here. So, you can’t… it’s harder for them to muddy the water.
Jen Rubin
Yeah, I have, a piece about this tomorrow, and there’s… a tragedy and a sadness that it took this, that people are not able to see the humanity of a Black person, or a Hispanic person, or an undocumented person. There have been other killings by ICE. They have… people have died in custody of ICE. But until many people are presented with someone who they can identify with so closely, just like me, says the white person, or says the… they find it hard to relate, and that is a sad. of humanity and perhaps a lack of empathy, but that is kind of where we are. And, you’re right in that the victim should not matter. It does not matter, of course. You don’t get to, only kill, and people who are bad, people don’t deserve to be killed, or people who… Run a traffic light, don’t deserve to be killed, and certainly immigrants don’t be… deserve to be killed. But because these people were so pristine, and I think also because you had the visual evidence that people could watch over and over again, and they saw the lies. That it… the whole thing has begun to kind of sink under its own weight. And I want to, in the time we have left, talk about two other things which have a Chicago angle, to be sure. And that, of course, is Gregory Bovino, who was, told to leave, Minnesota. There’s some reports that he’s now going to retire. He was, of course, the face of this operation, Operation Midway, Midway Blitz, and, was called into court. He frankly lied multiple times about what he was doing and not doing. Any reaction yet, or is it too certain to say, what, Chicagoans feel about him getting the boot? Is there a certain amount of glee out there, or too soon to say?
Lynn Sweet
Too soon to say, because the… the confirmation… I do not know, is he… going to still work from Southern California? Is he on the road to retirement? And is it in 2027? But more important, I think, politically and policy-wise, is he sidelined? I, I, you know, let the… let his accountants deal with whether or not he’s retired and gets his pension or whatever.
Jen Rubin
I agree.
Lynn Sweet
is he sidelined? If he is sidelined, because we know that Trump sent in Tom Harmon to be the, overseer of whatever’s happening in Minnesota, which is also coming as these court cases are churning through, you know, Minneapolis, dealing with, why are there 3,000 agents here? What is the purpose? What’s going on? As the governor likes to say, we are 24th in immigration. in… in the nation, you know, sorry if I’m, you know, giving you some information that, That doesn’t make sense, but you and I know that this is… This is where, hopefully, the judiciary does kick in and get some answers to reveal, you know, kind of like the nakedness of what they’re doing in Minnesota.
Jen Rubin
Yeah. Pricated on, on that.
Lynn Sweet
on the welfare fraud, which, okay, there are other… many, many ways to deal with it, besides bringing in troops and ending up with the killing of two people. So…
Jen Rubin
Yes. I have no reaction for you yet, because these things, there’s so much news… Take a while, yeah. And people are trying to deal with the deep freeze here right now.
Lynn Sweet
These things take a bit of time, but, we have a podcast called Bean Bovino that you can find wherever you get your podcasts, from WBEZ and sometimes big series on who he is, and, you know. the man that was made, how he… how he grew up on the East Coast, came to California in his career. So, he… he is… if he’s out of the public eye, I think I’m guessing, guessing, I haven’t reported on this yet, that the Trump White House hopes that this alone takes some heat off them. No, it also depends what Harmon does.
Jen Rubin
Absolutely, and I think, there’s very strong speculation that Kristi Noem may be, the next one to go, but of course, the people in Minnesota really want ICE and Border Patrol out. They don’t really care who the face of these people are. I want to end on this. There is a woman in Chicago who was shot multiple times. She was then shot… charged with a crime. Maramar Mar… Maramar, Martinez, excuse me. And, she has made an interesting request. She wants the body camera footage and other materials about this incident released. What is that about? And is this… yes, there you go. Ask Judge to let her release the evidence. And the government, strangely enough, doesn’t want this out. This is part of the transparency issue that is a big part of what is going on in the ICE slash, the, you know, Border Patrol. Show that picture one more time for us. There we go. Woman shot by Border Patrol in Chicago asked judge to let her release the evidence, it says. So, Lynn, why is that significant, do you think?
Lynn Sweet
Okay, and by the way, the Chicago Sun-Times and other media outlets are part of the entities that have gone to court seeking access to the evidence. Here’s why this is important. In Chicago, in Minnesota, in other places, you need to create the record of what is happening. You need to create the record that people could use in these court cases. You know, so, she… we say in John Seidel’s great, our great federal court reporter story, that the woman who survived 5 gunshots from a Border Patrol agent in Chicago last fall… only to be criminally charged and then cleared, now wants a judge’s permission to share evidence that shows how the feds respond when, quote, their agents use deadly force against U.S. citizens. I think… You need… this is part of the evidence That needs to get out to.
Jen Rubin
Correct.
Lynn Sweet
the case. You, you need these videos because the the… Efforts of the Trump administration to paper over, to obfuscate. To mislead people on what has happened, and who’s involved, and what federal agents did is, is, it, it, it, it is… It is instructive to see how powerful these messages that come from authorities are in being persuasive.
Jen Rubin
Absolutely.
Lynn Sweet
or at least mudding the waters. You know, I know sometimes when I do interviews, it’s like, Lynn, who knows what happened? Actually, you can know what happened.
Jen Rubin
Yes, you do. You absolutely do.
Lynn Sweet
This era that we’re in, unlike when we started our careers, everybody is walking around with a video camera. I cannot imagine… you know, all hail to the, you know, to the video camera. I cannot imagine in our careers if everything was videoed all the time.
Jen Rubin
It’s unbelievable, and I think the, of all people, the Trump people, who are expert propagandists, who are expert at controlling information. To have them be laid low, because everyone has one of these things, I think they did not imagine. They have gotten where they are by having a closed right-wing media sphere, with Fox and OAN and all the rest of them, and they can talk to their people and try to convince them of anything. But the power of these images is such that even their information bubble is not immune to And it gets through. And I think that’s been the lesson of the last few weeks.
Lynn Sweet
It’s not a person of the year, but the device of the year. I would say, video phones. Because… Absolutely.
Jen Rubin
Thank you.
Lynn Sweet
We could speak louder than any spokesperson, or citizen, or witness, because we now know how easy it is to persuade people that the truth cannot be known.
Jen Rubin
Yes.
Lynn Sweet
26th. you know, that kind of may be an exception to what I’m talking about, because I don’t know how people could look at all the videos in totality, trace back the origin of the videos, and determine what happened, didn’t happen, but that will be a discussion for another day on how people, you know, what people choose to believe. But for the moment. For this moment in time, getting the order to get the evidence on the, You know, on the record, you have to get it out. Also, the… government, and this is Christy Noam, she keeps tossing around the term domestic terrorists.
Jen Rubin
Yes!
Lynn Sweet
can, you know… Domestic terrorist is not somebody who peacefully protests, even if they step over a line.
Jen Rubin
Absolutely, absolutely. And I think it’s the incongruity of the lies and the reality that we are now seeing. We’re gonna have to leave it there, Lynn, but thank you so much. This continues to reverberate, and although Illinois is not that far from Minnesota, you can see the degree to which Minnesota has now dominated the news in other states. The Senate campaign. Bovino. this woman, and I think we’re gonna, this is a good thing, folks, that the nation’s, attention is focused on this, because as we have talked about, this is a serious, serious problem, and a serious threat to democracy. But Lynn, thank you, and thank your colleagues as well at, the radio station and at the Sun Times, this is what we need from the media, which is. Debate, coverage, facts, Pictures, and that’s how we, ultimately protect our democracy.
Lynn Sweet
Thank you, so let me just do the plug. Sometimes.com. It’s free, no paywall. We do ask for your email, but you can get everything we’ve been talking about in our incredible ongoing coverage. It’s open to the public, open for business. Please stop by.
Jen Rubin
Thank you, thank you. We’ll look forward to seeing you next time. Take care, Lynn. Bye-bye.
