UPDATE: "Too little, too late?" as Heidner Dumps More Money into Governor Campaign
Suburban businessman Rick Heidner speaks at a GOP gubernatorial forum in Tazewell County in December. (Photo: Chicago Tribune)
When suburban businessman Rick Heidner jumped into the GOP primary for Governor late last fall, putting together a last minute ballot collection operation, talk from Heidner’s camp centered around the resources he was willing to invest in his own campaign.
Heidner’s property company spent over $100,000 to get him on the ballot and the candidate himself dumped $1,000,000 of his own money into the race in October.
“There’s more where that came from,” one insider told us in early November.
But, since then, Heidner has raised money from the real estate community and Chicago area business executives, but hasn’t invested any more of his own money in the race.
With under five weeks to go and trailing badly in polls, it appears Heidner won’t be putting more money into the race.
Multiple sources say Heidner’s campaign is operating as if there won’t be additional investment from Heidner for a last-minute TV push to help close the gap with GOP frontrunner, former Sen. Darren Bailey.
Heidner has not made any broadcast TV buys as of yet, and has bought limited cable, including for the college football national championship game in the Chicago area last month. Most of his advertising has been through streaming platforms, social media, and one mail piece sent to Republicans around the state.
“He sees the writing on the wall,” one insider with insight into the Heidner campaign said on the condition of anonymity. “President Trump isn’t going to endorse and he’s way behind in the polls. Why throw good money after bad?”
Heidner’s campaign did not respond to a request for comment.
UPDATE: Heidner’s campaign reported an additional $250,000 contribution from the candidate Wednesday.
Many top Republicans say it would have taken a large sum of cash to get Heidner on TV over the final weeks of campaign to attack Bailey and build his own name ID.
“If he’s hasn’t gone in big by now, he’s not going to,” said one Republican consultant not affiliated with any of the campaigns. “It’s time to write him off as a real contender.”
Heidner has outraised all of his Republican opponents in 2026 without the influx of his own cash. His campaign has reported around $225,000 in large donations since January 1, including $50,000 from manufacturing executive Jim Malinowski of Hindsdale, $50,000 from real estate investor Constantino Poulakis of Homer Glen, and $10,000 from fruit and vegetable distributor Anthony Marano.
A WGN-TV poll last month showed Heidner trailing the rest of the field with around 1% of the vote. An internal poll from the Bailey campaign released late last month showed Heidner in second place with 9% of the vote, but trailing Bailey by close to 40 percentage points.
