Earlier this month, 11 elected officials were sworn into DuPage County offices.
Of those, nine were Democrats.
In the aftermath of November’s general election, DuPage County — once a Republican stronghold — appears to have shifted decisively to the left, experts and observers say.
“I think we have strong evidence to suggest that we can now say that DuPage is reliably blue,” said Melissa Mouritsen, a professor of political science at the College of DuPage.
From federal races to county contests, the 2024 election saw the Democratic Party emerge strongly in DuPage. Voters favored Democratic candidates in four of the five congressional races that reached the county. Democrats also captured a larger share of the county’s vote in three of the state’s four senatorial races and twelve of the state’s sixteen representative races.
Three-term DuPage County Coroner Richard Jorgensen was ousted countywide by Democratic challenger Judith Lukas. Democratic incumbents prevailed in their reelection bids for track clerk and auditor, while the Democratic candidate scored a victory in the race for recorder.
In the DuPage County Board, a Democratic challenger ousted her Republican predecessor, while other Democratic incumbents retained their seats, leaving the body with twelve Democrats, six Republicans and a Democratic chairman.
Eighteen years ago, there wasn’t a single Democrat on the board.
Change of course
For more than a century, DuPage County was unmistakably Republican. But over the past two decades — especially the past six years — Democrats have gradually loosened the Republican Party’s grip on the county.
In 2006, the province had an all-Republican government with 18 seats. Over the next decade, Democrats grew to have a small presence in the body. But then the tide really started to turn.
In 2018 alone, the body added six Democrats to the mix. That same year, Jean Kaczmarek was elected clerk, making her the first Democrat to win a national office in DuPage since 1934.
In 2020, Democrats won another four seats on the board, flipping the majority in their favor. Two years later, voters elected the board’s first Democratic chairman in at least three-quarters of a century.
It all pointed to a change of course. But even as Democrats took control of the board four years ago — something that hadn’t happened since the 1930s — questions loomed: Was DuPage County really blue? Was it purple? Will it last?
However, the November elections brought answers, observers say. That’s even despite Vice President Kamala Harris topping the list and underperforming President Joe Biden by nearly three points.
“I think it is a lasting change,” Mouritsen said. And the bottom line is there’s a bigger shift in what the electorate thinks, meaning residents “generally identify more as Democrats,” she said.
Mouritsen attributes the change in part to secular shifts, including demographics, and that “we are seeing more people moving to DuPage from Cook County, bringing their politics with them.”
Another factor is map making, Mouritsen said. Favorable political districts for Democrats in Illinois that began in 2010 gave way to Democratic gerrymandering in DuPage, she said. A third component is purely the work of the party itself.
Mouritsen called the trio of factors “three legs of a table,” all of which contributed to the Democrats’ ascendancy in Dupage. Then, six years ago, the change – already in the works – was accelerated with something Mouritsen called the “Trump effect.”
Rejection
In the 2016 presidential election, Donald Trump received 39% of the vote in the county, almost nine points less than Mitt Romney four years earlier. Locally, there seemed to be an aversion to Trump, according to Mouritsen.
“(I would say) there was a strong contingent of Republicans in DuPage County who felt that way,” she said, adding that this in turn helped fuel the blue shift already taking root in the county.
Former DuPage County Board Democrat Elizabeth “Liz” Chaplin says she has also found that, “(With) what we’re hearing nationally … a lot of people just don’t like this rhetoric (and) I think that’s really true. helped us resonate with voters.”
Chaplin was first elected to the board in 2012. She held her seat for another 12 years before leaving to successfully run for county recorder this year.
“I mean, from the age of 12 to where we are now, I never thought it would have happened so quickly,” she said. For her, Trump’s first term is the “dominating factor” in propelling that change, she said.
Jennifer Zordani, who served as acting chair of the DuPage County Democratic Party until mid-November, also thinks repudiation has played an important role in the change, she says, but less in direct response to Trump and more against extremist ideology in general .
“I don’t know if it’s as much a rejection of Trump… (as it is) a rejection of extremists on issues,” she said.
Where Zordani and Chaplin align is in their belief in where DuPage has ended up today in recent years.
“I think it’s completely blue,” Zordani said.
Chaplin reiterated: “I see (the province) really blue.”
Across the aisle, however, observations vary.
‘Green wave’
James Zay, a DuPage County Board member since 1999 and chairman of the DuPage County Republicans, says he wouldn’t call the recent changes a blue wave, but a “green wave.”
“The Democrats are probably outselling ten to one in all these races in the House and Senate and in the media in the Chicago markets. … And you can’t tell me it doesn’t affect the mood,” Zay said.
Democrats had a sizable financial advantage in the state legislative races, with the Democrats’ House campaign organization and the state party funneling millions of dollars to candidates facing potentially stiff Republican competition.
As for other potential downsides, Zay dismissed the idea that Trump would be a deterrent to local Republicans. There were more requests for Trump signs ahead of the November election than he has seen before, Zay said.
Speaking about the broader trajectory of the Republican Party, both in the years leading up to November and in the future, Zay acknowledged that there is work ahead for the party. Namely building the Republican stronghold from the ground up.
DuPage Republicans have lost a once-strong pipeline of emerging candidates in recent years, Zay said. Lately, the party has “not done a good job of moving people from park district boards and municipal boards to higher office,” he said. An agricultural system needs to be rebuilt, he noted.
According to Zay, the province is now more purple than blue.
“I would definitely say it’s a 60-40 country (from Democrats to Republicans) right now,” he said. But that split, as recent years have shown, is subject to change, he added. “It could change at any moment. I mean, who knows, you know?”
A blue future?
The sustainability of Democrats’ momentum in DuPage is difficult to determine, said Stephen Maynard Caliendo, dean of North Central College’s College of Arts and Sciences.
Caliendo, who is also a political science professor, expects the shift to continue for some time, but that doesn’t mean it will never return, he said. There are again a number of factors that play in favor of the Democrats. One of them is the incumbency advantage, Caliendo says. Another example is the party’s statewide power, he said, especially when it comes to redistricting.
“With the state always in Democrats’ control, it is very unlikely … that they will redraw districts in a way that will put them — including candidates in DuPage — at a disadvantage, he said.
What could make a difference is the country’s larger political climate, Caliendo said.
“The reason I could be wrong,” he said, “is because we may be seeing a fundamental realignment of the parties… and what I mean by that is I don’t know if the Republican Party can survive Trump in the form that it lasted since 1980.”
If that’s the case, Caliendo continued, “everything I said about redistricting and whatever won’t make any difference because people who used to vote Democrat might vote Republican” and vice versa.
What DuPage Democrats can — and should do — for now is avoid complacency, Chaplin and Zordani advise.
“We are still growing. … We cannot rest on our laurels,” Chaplin said.
“I think we have to keep working to let people know who we are,” Zordani added, “(and) what we do. … We’re all blue, but it would never be something I would take for granted.”
Chicago Tribune reporters Jeremy Gorner, Olivia Olander, Adriana Pérez and Karina Atkins contributed.
tkenny@chicagotribune.com
