Tuesday, October 26, 2010
 
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Big names hit Ill. in campaign's last days

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[October 26, 2010]  CHICAGO (AP) -- In the final days before the Nov. 2 election, Democrats and Republicans are leaning on party heavyweights, energizing their bases and looking for swing voters in the high-profile races for President Barack Obama's old Senate seat and for Illinois governor.

HardwareObama and former President Bill Clinton will be in Chicago this week to support Democrats Alexi Giannoulias, who is in a razor-tight Senate race against Republican congressman Mark Kirk, and Gov. Pat Quinn, also locked in a close race with his GOP challenger.

Kirk, who touted the backing of some black ministers on Monday, is getting a financial boost from two groups backed by GOP guru Karl Rove. The groups have spent about $4.6 million on the race and helped finance ads against Giannoulias, according to the Sunlight Foundation, a nonpartisan Washington-based watchdog group that tracks campaign finance numbers.

Kirk was scheduled to join more than a dozen other Republican candidates Monday, including Quinn's challenger, state Sen. Bill Brady of Bloomington, at a rally sponsored by a national organization of Jewish Republicans.

Democrats have more work to do than Republicans to energize their base, but both sides need to sway independent and swing voters, said Kent Redfield, a professor emeritus of politics at the University of Illinois Springfield.

While Republicans are charged up ideologically, some Democrats aren't happy with Obama because they've been hurt by the slumping economy, are dissatisfied with his progress on gay rights or think he settled for too little change in health care reform, Redfield said.

"It's kind of finishing the sale with the undecideds, the moderates and making sure the true believers get to the polls," he said.

The candidates are doing their part.

Kirk, a five-term congressman from Chicago's northern suburbs, worked the crowds at Northwestern and Northern Illinois University football games over the weekend. Giannoulias, the Illinois state treasurer, attended a more traditional get-out-the-vote rally in Chicago.

"We need people to come out and vote. It's such an incredibly, incredibly important election," he said.

Giannoulias, who said he's filling his schedule with voter rallies, can use all the attention he can get. Kirk is heading into the final weeks of the campaign with four times as much money to spend, despite Giannoulias' fundraising help from Obama.

Kirk had $4.4 million available after the quarter that ended Sept. 30, compared Giannoulias’ less than $1.2 million. Since then, the White House has given more help to Giannoulias, with fundraising visits this month by both the president and first lady Michelle Obama.

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Giannoulias will get another high-profile boost when Clinton visits Chicago on Tuesday, and Obama is scheduled to come back Saturday.

Two polls this week show Kirk with a slight edge over Giannoulias in a race that would be an embarrassing loss for Democrats -- though both candidates have had their share of struggles this campaign. Kirk has admitted embellishing aspects of his military service, while Giannoulias has had to deal with the fallout of the failure earlier this year of his family's Chicago bank.

In the governor's race, Quinn and Brady made their pitch to black voters over the weekend. Both spoke at a massive church on Chicago's South Side. U.S. census figures show nearly 15 percent of Illinois' 13 million people are black, with the majority of them living in Cook County, home to Chicago.

Brady is scheduled to appear later this week at a rally in suburban Chicago with Republican governors from Louisiana, Mississippi and Virginia.

Quinn, the former lieutenant governor, is trying to win a full term to the job he inherited in January 2009, when former Gov. Rod Blagojevich was removed from office.

Brady has flatly rejected raising the income tax, while Quinn has proposed a 1 percentage point increase for education as the state struggles with a $13 billion deficit.

[Associated Press; By DEANNA BELLANDI]

Copyright 2010 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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