How the Illinois Democratic Party Increases Voter Apathy

I’m a firm believer in learning lessons from our past as a species so we may amend those mistakes going forward. One of these lessons is eloquently explained in videos such as “The July Revolution (1820 to 1830)” by Historia Civilis. This video describes democracy as a vital release valve of pressure in a society. Democracy isn’t simply the most moral sounding system, nor the most empowering system for every individual in a society. It is an invaluable survival tool for states because it gives the population a place to put energy and pressure to effect changes in their daily lives. Without these tools, or even worse, when the tools were once possessed but are taken away, the death of said state becomes inevitable. Arguably most revolutions in history could have been avoided had the leadership understood this principle, be it the British refusing to give Americans power over their own laws and taxation, the July Revolution in France where the monarchy refused to accept the parliament as anything other than a rubber stamp on his decisions, or the Russian Revolution where the Tsarist regime had fiercely opposed any significant democratic reform for centuries. 

Circling The Wagons

Unfortunately for all Illinoisans, the party that dominates our state government (and many counties too) seems to have slept through this segment of their history classes. Through a series of ironically undemocratic decisions, the Illinois Democratic Party is (through a combination of means both intentional and unintentional) shutting off democratic release valves for public energy. This critique applies to all levels of governance from local to federal, however for sake of brevity I will focus primarily on how these decisions impact federal office races in Illinois (i.e. the U.S. House and Senate). Let’s start with a point of critique that I don’t think is intentionally done to increase voter apathy, and that is what I call “Circling the Wagons”. It’s no surprise that incumbents get disproportionately more support from elected Democratic officials and township organizations during the general election as well as the primary. I actually think this can in some circumstances have a positive effect on voter participation in the general election. However, by so disproportionately supporting the incumbent candidates during the primary (i.e. an election in which losing to an opposition party is literally impossible) it actively discourages people from running and keeps primary vote counts low. Based on my count the numbers breakdown as follows:

While I can not speak for the other 3 races, I did have the privilege of volunteering in the primary for IL-10, and I can confirm 100% of democratic township organizations and county board officials getting behind the incumbent was not due to a lack of effort on the challenger’s part, quite the opposite in fact. These gaps reaffirm what everyone already knows, there is a massive disconnect between the public and Democratic officials on who they support. 

The Money Machine

It’s not just establishment Democrats backing incumbents almost exclusively, the ultra wealthy all backed incumbents whenever possible. According to FEC data last updated in February 2026, the gap in receipts (i.e. money received) are at eye watering levels. Starting with the least offensive, incumbent Mike Quigley bested his challengers by over half a million dollars. Including most prominently Matt Conroy, a young progressive who impressively got a quarter of the vote in his first ever run for office on small dollar donations. Quigley was fueled by a combination of: SpaceX (the infamous space company run by Elon Musk), RTX Corp (a company that manufactures missiles, drones, etc.), and more. In the 6th Congressional district, incumbent Sean Casten had a $1,416,475 lead on Joey Ruzevich who, like Matt Conroy, was a young progressive and 1st time congressional candidate fueled by small dollar donations. Likewise, Joey also got roughly a quarter of the vote. Casten’s top donors consist of: bankers, insurance companies, and airlines. In the 13th, incumbent Nikki Budzinski received $2,051,016 more than her challenger, yes not 2 million total, 2 million more than her opponent meaning the actual number she got was well in excess of 2 million dollars…again, for a primary. Her opponent was Dylan Blaha who had gained arguably the 2nd most traction in media both locally and nationally out of all progressive candidates, behind only Kat Abughazaleh. Why so many unions gave $10,000 to Nikki in a Democratic primary where her opponent was to the left of her is beyond me. The worst of all is IL-10, with an obscene $2,249,602 gap between incumbent Brad Schneider and his progressive challenger Morgan Coghill. Brad gets most of his money from the for-profit healthcare industry & insurance companies. He is also backed by the pro-Israel lobby far more directly and openly than any other Democrat in Congress form Illinois. Like the other challengers we’ve discussed, Morgan was fueled by small dollar donations in his first ever run for office and got over 20% of the vote against a long entrenched incumbent. These primaries are drowning in quantities of money many people in my generation (I’m 28) will never see cumulatively across their entire lives being spent. The negative consequences are being exacerbated by the changes in our media landscape. The downfall of traditional news companies gives further advantages to big money candidates, as grassroots supported candidates no longer have a single platform or that would expose them to a majority of the voters. The only way they can even have their existence known is if they do a constant marathon of doorknocking and going on various shows\podcasts on a weekly basis. 

BYOB (Banning You On the Ballot)

In some ways the Illinois Democratic party has brought us to such an embarrassing state of affairs that those who were defeated by big money and the establishment can consider themselves lucky in a way, for at least they made it on the ballot at all. Many good candidates with genuine public support were kicked off the ballot either directly or indirectly by the Illinois Democratic Establishment.  Yet curiously, those who had no public support – and all Republican candidates – were not challenged off the ballot. Even under the most generous possible understanding of what “the left” even is, it’s clear the Illinois Democratic party considers itself in opposition to the left – far more so than the right. I went to many candidate forums during this cycle, and the moment the crowd responded most positively was when Jump Shepherd got on stage and announced he’s a member of the Black Panther Party running for US Senate. The crowd immediately erupted in claps, cheers, and smiles. When he spoke on stage it was clear he genuinely understood mutual aid and his own political education, and the public liked him. Yet apparently, it was a priority to kick someone like him off the ballot in Illinois. Satnaam Mago received more than enough signatures for ballot access with only grassroots donations and a genuine progressive platform, yet excuses were found to “invalidate” enough of his signatures to disqualify him. When I last spoke with him on the matter he mentioned if he could redo one thing he would get double the minimum required signatures. That only certain types of candidates have to worry about getting double the signatures required for the same exact race is blatantly unjust and unequal.

Juan Beto Ruiz was gaining massive popularity in his race for Lake County Board and seemed poised to beat incumbent Esiah Campos who many constituents criticize for his poor attendance on the Board. Despite having more public support, gaining more than enough signatures to be on the ballot, and not having the signatures themselves invalidated, the establishment managed to get him off the ballot. You would think the Democratic Party would see benefits to a popular challenger winning against a lazy incumbent. Sadly, the Democratic Party dominated court system ruled that because his ballot-approved name and records of his legal name weren’t 100% aligned, he should be kicked off the ballot. This is interesting because that standard isn’t applied to Bradley Schneider, a candidate who runs on the ballot as “Brad Schneider”. Esiah Campos commented after Juan was first kicked off the ballot, saying “[i]f you’re running for office, you must be able to follow the straightforward and transparent rules set by the legislature…if you can’t do that, how can you be an effective steward as an elected official?”. Unsurprisingly, if you know me, I felt obligated to respond to him by pointing out that getting your name wrong on a paper in the eyes of a bunch of judges is not nearly as damning on your stewardship as your attendance and overall public support. Mr. Campos, who has too busy of a schedule to make enough county board meetings without being kicked off of multiple committees due to poor attendance, had plenty of time to react to my fair criticism immediately. Within less than an hour after I posted my comment, it was deleted, I was blocked, and he decided to message me personally. He sent me a picture of the ruling kicking Juan off the ballot and said “[t]his is why he was removed. Had nothing to do with signature requirements. Thank you for your understanding, God bless”. I was reasonably confused as my critique was about the legalistic technicality, not the signature requirements themselves (because Juan achieved the signature requirement). I responded “[t]hat’s the point of my disagreement, he did the work and got the signatures. This is all on a legal technicality”. Then Juan’s case went through a silly legal back and forth where he (justifiably) got back on the ballot briefly, but then unfortunately less than a week before the election was kicked off the ballot yet again. The Illinois Democratic Party is making it clear they will fight any challenger every step of the way and do everything and anything possible to not let others be on the ballot. How “democratic” of them! 

Killing Democracy (Legally)

Little did I know when I began my run for Congress in Illinois 10th District as a 3rd party candidate in 2025 how quickly I would encounter hurdles from the establishment myself. To begin, I knew I would need over 16 times the amount of signatures gathered than the Democratic Party candidates to even be on the ballots. Despite those odds, the second the 3rd party petition gathering period started, I immediately began putting in the work necessary, knocking on over 2,000 doors in one week. Only after I had gotten this far did I get news that all my efforts were for naught. Because I helped my opponent’s primary challenger get on the ballot as a matter of principle, I was legally barred from collecting any other party or independent signatures for the rest of the 2026 election cycle. This forces someone who is genuine about electoral reform into some level of hypocrisy if they refuse to help other candidates on the ballot. I believe any candidate willing to run that can get a few hundred signatures for ballot access should be given the opportunity to be on our ballot, period. By putting a 16 times larger signature count, barring anyone from mutual signature gathering between parties, and setting the 3rd party ballot access period after the two major parties’ signature gathering, it was simply too much to achieve ballot access in one cycle starting with no money, platform, or name recognition. With no avenues for ballot access remaining this cycle, I recalibrated my campaign as a write-in option. However, yet again by merely participating in a democracy and being bipartisan myself I would have my campaign hopes challenged. 

Illinois is an especially undemocratic and arguably unconstitutional state. You can quite literally be legally punished for voting even as a completely valid voter! Turns out, EVERYONE who votes in the primaries is barred from running in any partisan seat in Illinois for the rest of that election cycle. Yes you read that correctly. You, dear reader, who voted in these primaries, just know you have less rights to participate in the electoral process for the rest of this cycle should you ever consider electoral politics yourself. I’m not proud to admit it, but for the first week after hearing that news I had just completely had it with everything associated with our government and electoralism in general. I was absolutely furious, however I had fortunately already built up many connections on my campaign thus far. Those newly found friends and allies inspired and pushed me to not give up. In time, I have heeded their advice, and now I fully intend to continue my campaign in the Illinois 10th Congressional District as a write-in. Given the long odds of winning, I suspect the Illinois Democratic Party won’t even bother reacting to me. Should they choose to sue our campaign however, I would gladly appreciate the opportunity to challenge a law punishing citizens for voting in court. If that isn’t killing our democracy “legally” then I don’t know what is.    

The pattern here is clear to see. At every step of the electoral process the Illinois Democratic Party is doing everything it can to curtail real democracy, and as a result keep voter apathy levels high. From when you announce your candidacy to voting day, they will do everything to make no votes count for you. They will take money from anyone and everyone to outspend challengers, including those on the right-wing like Musk. If you try to run outside of the Democratic party they make ballot access and equal platforming impossible. If you try to run inside the Democratic Party they circle the wagons to protect unpopular incumbents. Allies often vent their frustrations to me about low voter engagement, but how can we be frustrated with voters who feel their vote is not valuable in a system like this? If there is any avenue to get enough voter turnout to overcome these obstacles, it must be one where we don’t mistakenly put all (or even a majority) of the blame on the shoulders of common folks.