The state of Illinois is ready for its turn to vote in the primaries on Super Tuesday, February 5 where locally, there will be a few highly contested battles on the Democratic side in Rock Island County. Paul Rumler looks to defeat incumbent State Senator Mike Jacobs and former Lane Evans staff worker, Jerry Lack looks to defeat another incumbent, State Representative Mike Boland in the 71st district.
All registered voters in Rock Island County can vote but if you live West of I-74 you have a different state representative, Pat Verschoore. If you live east of I-74, you will be able to vote in the likely close race between Boland and Lack. People will also be able to vote for state senate.
Of course, the election most people care about right now is the presidential race and Illinois voters will be voting for that too on February 5. Though it’s highly unlikely that Barack Obama loses, 100 delegates will be elected to the Democratic National Convention. Republicans will elect 57 delegates as well.
Delegates to the national convention will have their presidential affiliation on the ballot. Though in theory, one would vote for delegate the same choice as they had for president, they do not have to. Each of the 19 congressional districts has a predetermined number of delegates. In the Republican race, all the delegates for a district go to the winner of that district but in the Democratic race, 15 percent of the vote is needed before a delegate is even selected.
With no clear candidate having the necessary 50 percent of the vote for either party, the more delegates a candidate receives, even if it’s one, can lead that candidate to the presidency. When Illinois voters vote on February 5, they will vote with 23 other states and the delegates being voted on, will have a huge impact in the Democratic Convention in Denver (August 25 to 28) and the Republican Convention in Minneapolis-St. Paul (Sept. 1 to 4).
The last time no clear nominee was known was in 1952 when some backroom deals helped the Democrats nominate Adlai Stevenson and the Republicans nominating Dwight Eisenhower.
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