Garcia and Moylan and the Bait-and-Switch
Congressman Jesus “Chuy” Garcia speaks to reporters at an event earlier this month.. (Photo: Chicago Tribune)
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OPINION
I did a panel on “Chicago Tonight” on WTTW in Chicago a couple of weeks ago and the story of Congressman Jesus “Chuy” Garcia (D-Chicago), who pulled a fast one with his nominating petitions. He filed for re-election and, on the final day to file nominating petitions, his Chief of Staff, Patty Garcia (no relation) filed petitions to run for the seat.
Chuy Garcia, poof, announces he’ll withdraw, and hand the seat to the Patty Garcia, who won’t have to work very hard to win a now-unopposed Democratic primary and will only face a nominal Republican opponent in a district Kamala Harris won by around 30 points last year.
I called it “the worst of our politics.”
In a political system with alums like Rod Blaojevich, Michael Madigan, George Ryan, and Mel Reynolds (ick), I think that’s saying something.
Passing off a seat isn’t a particularly rare thing in Illinois politics, unfortunately. Bill Lipinski did it in 2004, Lane Evans did it in 2006, Tim Johnson did it in 2012. Lipinski helped install his son, Evans helped install his Chief of Staff, and Johnson left an open race to replace him that led to the choice of Rodney Davis.
But the difference is that Lipinski, Evans, and Johnson waited until after the primary to announce they were stepping aside. While voters didn’t specifically get a choice on their replacement, at least elected Democratic or Republican committeemen had the ability to choose the candidate.
In the 4th District, not even the representative of primary voters get a voice. The Garcia team made the choice for them.
Their incredibly weak talking point tracks along the lines of, roughly, “thems the rules.” They’re right, of course, but the rules suck.
Garcia, who pulled a similar shenanigan when then-Rep. Luis Guttierez announced just a few days before the filing deadline that he wouldn’t seek re-election gave Garcia a huge boost in inheriting the seat, should have known better. He does know better.
But the problem here is that politicians don’t care. They don’t care about consolidating or keeping power or the pushback their shady deals get. It’s a sign that politicians are in it for themselves and only themselves.
Garcia has admitted that he know almost a week before the filing deadline that he wouldn’t be running for re-election. All he had to do was put a statement up on social media that he had changed his mind and wouldn’t be running again. It would have given potential candidates plenty of time to get enough signatures to qualify for the ballot.
But that wouldn’t help him and his insider choice, would it?
Rep. Marty Moylan (D-Des Plaines)
Rep. Marty Moylan (D-Des Plaines) has remained under the radar over the past couple of weeks, though he’s doing the same thing, essentially. Moylan filed to run for re-election and, on the final day of petition filing, imagine that! Moylan’s Chief of Staff, Justin Cochran, filed petitions.
Moylan, who has had recent health issues, said he plans to resign from the House soon, but hasn’t given a specific date. But, why go through the charade? A good, moderate, well funded Republican could make it a bit of a race in the right circumstance (assuming 2026 is not the right circumstance for almost any suburban Republican), but this is a pretty safely gerrymandered Democratic seat.
Why not let the voters decide?
Moylan withdrew his candidacy this week. Chuy Garcia has yet to do so has of Thursday night.
Garcia has become a bit of a pariah in Washington, if you can imagine the level of mess it takes to be a pariah in Washington these days. The House voted to reprimand him after he was criticized by members of his own party.
I don’t know if there’s a legislative fix to this, but I hope we can find a solution to stop these shenanigans that do nothing sort of disenfranchise voters, no matter the county, city, or party. Maybe a special filing period kicks in if an incumbent withdraws from the ballot? I don’t know.
We should hold politicians accountable for making bad moves that hurt us, their voters.
It’s about time that we start penalizing politicians for trying to screw us for their advantage.
I don’t tell people who to vote for, but I don’t think I’m out of line to tell voters in the 4th Congressional District and the 55th House District just how little the incumbents care about you.
They only care about themselves.
