Quinn Beat Brady In Illinois

Pat Quinn, the Democrat who replaced Rod Blagojevich as Illinois Governor, has defeated Republican opponent Sate Senator Bill Brady in a close midterm race, according to The Chicago Tribune. Quinn holds a roughly 19,000 vote lead which is believed to be insurmountable.  

Brady is expected to concede in a press conference today at 1:30 pm. 

Whitney Seeing Red Over Voting Machine Typo

Green Party Gubernatorial candidate Rich Whitney is seeing red over the misspelling of his name in electronic voting machines in 23 wards.  Whitney appears as ‘Rich Whitey’ on the screen that allows voters to review their choices on the machines and according to The Chicago Sun Times, the problem will not be fixed before the upcoming election.  

“I don’t want to be identified as ‘Whitey.’ If this is happening in primarily African-American wards, that’s an even bigger concern. I don’t know if this is machine politics at play or why this happened,” Whitney told the Chicago Sun Times.

Jim Allen, a spokesman for the Chicago Board of Elections, claims the misspelling will have little effect on the outcome of the election since 90 percent of voters will likely be using paper ballots.

“This is a difficult situation. We’ll make the best of it. But the important thing is the name is spelled correctly where it counts, and that’s where people are making the selection,”said Jim Allen.

The Whitney team may seek legal action in an attempt to fix the problem.

Closing Argument In Blago Trials Began Monday

The closing arguments in the federal corruption trial of former Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich began Monday. Blagojevich did not take the stand in Monday’s hearing but is expected to before the trial is over. The Illinois Democrat was removed from his office in January 2009 due to allegations that he attempted to sell the U.S. Senate seat that had previously been occupied by President Barack Obama.