EDITORIAL: Five legislative races in which your vote could make all the difference

Too many of us don’t vote, especially in midterm elections. We can’t get away with that this time.

Too much is on the line on Tuesday, in Washington and in Springfield.

We sorely need a shake-up in Washington, beginning — in our view — with a Democratic majority in the U.S. House to serve as a check against President Donald Trump’s most anti-democratic and anti-American impulses.

And we need more well-informed and bipartisan-minded legislators in Springfield to tackle our state’s huge financial and economic challenges. We need more elected leaders, that is to say, who eschew easy conservative or liberal ideology.

Failing to vote in the fractured America of 2018 is a failure of citizenship.

With that in mind, we’d again like to call your attention to five races for the state Legislature in which every vote could make the difference. All five races are tight, and all five of our endorsed candidates — four of them Democrats, one a Republican — are strong and worthy of your support.

Ann Gillespie in the 27th District

Democrat Ann Gillespie, an Arlington Heights lawyer who has our endorsement over former Rolling Meadows mayor and Republican state Sen. Tom Rooney, believes government does best when it is investing in its people. She learned that lesson at age 7 when her father suffered life-altering injuries in a plane crash, leading to the loss of her family home. Without government help, she doubts she or her sisters could have attended college.

Spending her career working on health care issues has made Gillespie knowledgeable about this important regulatory arena. She also favors a higher state minimum wage, a graduated state income tax and a wider sales tax to balance the state budget.

We urge you to vote for Ann Gillespie.

Maggie Trevor in the 54th District

Democrat and political scientist Maggie Trevor is tired of “no bipartisan cooperation and an attitude of my-way-or-burn-the-house down.” By contrast, Republican state Rep. Tom Morrison rigidly refused to vote for last year’s budget bill that ended the state’s long-running and disastrous budget impasse because it included a tax increase.

Trevor warns that further underfunding of the state’s higher education system will drive young people to other states and make Illinois less attractive for business. Trevor, who favors a graduated income tax, says a mix of dependable infrastructure, good education and responsible taxation is the key to attracting businesses and retaining workers.

Trevor also understands the ramifications of unwise tax policy from her days running a consulting business in Oakland, California. A gross receipts tax there took a sizable chunk out of her net earnings, making her business uncompetitive with out-of-state rivals. This was a factor in her decision to move back to Illinois.

We urge you to vote for Maggie Trevor.

Mary Edly-Allen in the 51st District

At a time when Trump is stirring baseless fears about dangerous migrants south of the border, the state Legislature has no room for someone like Republican candidate Helene Miller Walsh, who has jumped on that shameful fearmongering bandwagon.

After she was appointed to this seat in August, Walsh cleaned up her Facebook page, but she is still responsible for posting an unverified story that Muslim immigrants tried to rape a British tourist and then writing: “This is Islam.” She also, under a story about a candidate who happened to be a Muslim running for attorney general in Minnesota, wrote: “This is scary stuff. Muslims know that if they control the laws then they will forever restrict OUR Judea-Christian [sic] freedoms and encumber the masses.”

Our endorsed candidate is Democrat Mary Edly-Allen, a bilingual elementary school teacher from Libertyville, who says schools are weighed down with too many unfunded state mandates. She is pro-choice and opposes arming teachers in schools.

We urge you to vote for Mary Edly-Allen.

Eddie Corrigan in the 53rd District

In the March Republican primary, Eddie Corrigan stuck to his centrist ideas despite a tough challenge from the right.

Though a newcomer as a candidate, Corrigan worked as an outreach coordinator for U.S. Rep. Peter Roskam, which gives him a good understanding of how government works. He says he got into the race after seeing the burden that so many working-class families are facing. He favors a bipartisan plan to trim the state’s underfunded pension systems, would reduce the number of unfunded mandates placed on schools and backs sensible reforms to reduce gun violence, including universal background checks on gun buyers.

Democrat Mark Walker of Arlington Heights, who held this seat from 2009 through 2011, holds a number of policy views that are closer to our own, but Corrigan is all about bipartisanship — and Springfield needs a lot more of that.

We urge you to vote for Eddie Corrigan.

Diane Pappas in the 45th District

Diane Pappas is a wise choice in this district over Republican Christine Winger of Wood Dale.

She arrived in America from communist Poland in 1982 speaking no English. But she caught on fast. Pappas excelled in school at every step, then built a career as an in-house attorney for major companies. She gained strong dealmaking skills that could serve our state well during legislative tussles. A longtime independent who only recently declared herself a Democrat, she is unlikely to bow meekly to party leaders.

We urge you to vote for Diane Pappas.

RELATED

• Illinois Senate endorsements for the Chicago area
• Endorsements for 16 Illinois House races in the Chicago area, Districts 15 through 50

SUN-TIMES 2018 ILLINOIS VOTING GUIDE

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