The prevailing view is that the Illinois Republican Party lies on a slab in the morgue. “People think it’s dead from the shoulders down and up,” says conservative commentator Thomas Roeser.
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In 2002 the GOP lost control of both houses, and every statewide candidate went down but Judy Baar Topinka. “I’m an army of one,” says the state treasurer, who also became state party chairman shortly after the election. While commentator Bruce DuMont says the sassy Topinka “gives a zip to the party,” others carp that the chairmanship demands a full-time occupant. “This job is a miserable one, but it isn’t too much for me,” says Topinka, speaking of herself as party boss. “It keeps me very active.”
Topinka turned down a run for the Senate this year, and so did former governor Jim Edgar. The moderate Jim Thompson wing of the party yielded the field to a pack composed largely of wealthy conservatives. “These are C-grade candidates,” says Democratic strategist Peter Giangreco. “On the Republican side you have right-wing fire-breathers and unknowns with deep pockets.”
Illinois has been tilting Democratic. Al Gore carried the state 55 to 43 percent against George Bush, and in 2002 Senator Dick Durbin trounced his opponent by 20 points while Rod Blagojevich reclaimed the governor’s mansion after 26 years of Republican tenants. Blagojevich has jacked up his popularity in office by demonizing this group (he called recalcitrant state legislators “drunken sailors”) and that agency (Maryville Academy, the Illinois State Board of Education). “Rod is always establishing some straw man to aggrandize himself,” says Topinka. “We laugh whenever he goes into a gubernatorial speech, as to who’s going to be the fish in the barrel this time.”
“You never know what the backlash will be from the Ryan days,” Topinka says. “If there are more indictments and court proceedings, that won’t be good. But the Senate candidate we have will be someone carrying his own water, who isn’t beholden to anyone, and that will help sparkplug the situation for us.”
