Reporting with Fran Spielman
With Jesse Jackson Jr.’s political future increasingly in question, possible contenders are already circling.
And that’s besides the formal candidates already running against Jackson on Nov. 6 — independent Marcus Lewis, Republican Brian Woodworth and write-in candidate Anthony W. Williams.
“Jackson is finished as a congressman,” Lewis declared earlier this week — even before news broke that the Jacksons had put their Washington D.C. home up for sale.
If Jackson Jr. were to bow out before the fall election, it would be up to the chairman of the Cook County Democratic Party, Joe Berrios, to decide who to slate on the ballot.
Reached on Wednesday, Berrios said he didn’t know what to make of the Jacksons selling their D.C. house.
Berrios has had no conversations with either member of the couple about the congressman stepping down.
“She has not talked to me about it,” Berrios said.
Sources say that if Jackson were to get off the ballot, there’s an expectation that candidates will “come out of the woodwork” to replace him.
Ald. Sandi Jackson, however, “does not have the inside track on it,” sources said.
Already, there are people who have expressed interest in replacing Jackson, including Ald. Anthony Beale (9th), state Sen. Kwame Raoul and Cook County Board President Toni Preckwinkle’s chief of staff, Kurt Summers, who was also chief of staff to Chicago 2016 President Lori Healey until Chicago’s first-round flame-out in the Olympic sweepstakes.
