Rahm Emanuel

With Election Day a week away, Illinois Democrats are campaigning beyond state lines to aid party allies nationally. Rep. Raja Krishnamoorthi backed Texas Railroad Commissioner candidate Jon Rosenthal; Sen. Tammy Duckworth campaigned for Sherrod Brown in Ohio; Rahm Emanuel canvassed in New Hampshire; and Rep. Danny Davis and successor nominee La Shawn Ford campaigned for Wisconsin gubernatorial candidate David Crowley. Gov. JB Pritzker is focused on his own reelection, holding a large cash advantage and backing fellow Democrats financially.

Big money is also flowing into Illinois races, including Chicago school board contests, with GOP megadonors Dick and Elizabeth Uihlein and wealthy Democratic-aligned groups both spending heavily to shape outcomes from Springfield to Chicago.

Chicago voters on Nov. 3 will decide the city's first-ever fully elected school board, a change enabled by a 2021 state law that shifts governance away from a mayor-appointed seven-member board. The new board will have 21 members: one board president elected citywide, and 20 members representing geographic districts across the city. The Chicago Teachers Union and other community groups pushed for the change following the 2013 closure of 50 schools under then-Mayor Rahm Emanuel.

Three candidates are running for board president: Hilario Dominguez, backed by the Chicago Teachers Union; Jessica Biggs, backed by SEIU; and attorney Victor Henderson. Every registered Chicago voter can participate, regardless of whether they have children in the school system, since property taxes citywide fund more than half of Chicago Public Schools' budget. The board will oversee major decisions including hiring the superintendent, setting the budget and tax levy, and shaping policies on school calendars and bullying.

The former Charles Warrington Earle School, closed in 2013 under Mayor Rahm Emanuel along with 49 other Chicago schools, has reopened in West Englewood as the Earle School Apartments, a 50-unit affordable housing development. City leaders and developer Gorman & Company cut the ribbon this week on the roughly $35 million project at 6121 S. Hermitage Ave., which includes one- and two-bedroom units for households earning up to 60% of area median income, with nine units set aside at 15% AMI through a nonprofit trust fund program. The Phoenix Foundation will provide on-site supportive services for residents experiencing or at risk of homelessness.

The historic 1897 building, listed on the National Register of Historic Places, retains classroom doors and chalkboards as design features. Funding included city tax-increment financing, Chicago Recovery Plan dollars, and ComEd energy incentives. Mayor Brandon Johnson, a former organizer against the 2013 closures, called the project a model for repurposing shuttered schools. Gorman is pursuing similar conversions at other former Chicago schools, including Woods and Bontemps elementary buildings.

Nebraska's 2nd Congressional District, centered on Omaha and one of just eight districts nationally that backed Kamala Harris in 2024 while electing a Republican to the House, is shaping up as a marquee 2026 midterm contest following Rep. Don Bacon's retirement. Republican Omaha City Councilmember Brinker Harding, who has President Trump's endorsement and backing from House GOP leadership, faces Democratic activist Denise Powell, co-founder of Women Who Run Nebraska, who has campaigned alongside potential 2028 Democratic hopefuls Pete Buttigieg and Rahm Emanuel.

Trump plans to headline a Republican midterm convention in Dallas and has been visiting contested districts to energize the GOP base despite low approval ratings. Democrats, meanwhile, are betting that anxiety over Medicare and affordability, plus backlash to Trump, can flip the historically Republican-held seat, building on a local "Blue Dot" movement. Nebraska has voted Democratic for president only once since 1964, but the district has split its electoral vote three of the last five cycles, making it a rare swing-district test of Trump's midterm influence.