7 Fight For Senate Showdown With Duckworth: Illinois Primary Election

ILLINOIS ­­­— An election showdown with incumbent U.S. Senator Tammy Duckworth may be less than five months away, but seven candidates are hoping to emerge from Tuesday’s Republican primary election as the challenger standing between Duckworth and a third term.

Kathy Salvi, an attorney and former Lake County assistant public defender, seems perhaps best poised to take a run at Duckworth at a time when President Joe Biden’s performance in the White House may make Democrats ripe for the picking in the mid-term elections.

Salvi’s family is no stranger to politics. Her husband, Al, is a former state representative who ran for a U.S. Senate seat in 1996 and for Illinois Secretary of State in 1998. Salvi may be the most moderate of the candidates vying to face off with Duckworth, who is already considered a strong favorite to gain re-election come November.

But Salvi plans to make the most of Republicans’ general dissatisfaction with Biden and hopes to use a common-sense approach to facing Duckworth in the general election should she emerge victorious in Tuesday’s primary.

“I believe that Tammy Duckworth is defeatable in this particular cycle because the election will be a referendum on the Biden agenda, and she has been silent on so many things,” Salvi told the Chicago Tribune. “This seat has traditionally switched hands. And, in this state, we’ve been better served historically by having balance in the United States Senate."

Peggy Hubbard, a former police officer who also served in the U.S. Navy, is among the challengers also hoping to advance out of Tuesday’s Illinois primary. Hubbard's website describes her as being an "unbought and unbossed" person who, if elected, will be the worst nightmare of Washington's elite.

Hubbard is running on a Put America First platform, according to her campaign website on which she describes herself as a “pro-God, pro-life, pro-Trump, pro-veteran, pro-first responder conservative” who will put America and Illinois first.

Among the issues that she feels need addressing are building up forgotten communities, defending the Second Amendment, jumpstarting the economy, protecting the dignity of human life while also ensuring national security, and fixing the immigration process.

She says that her introduction to politics is indicative of her lifelong battle for truth and justice and to bring a hopeful future for Illinois' forgotten communities.

The rest of the field includes Casey Chlebek, a Polish immigrant who has spent much of his professional life working in information technology. Chlebek has worked for bigger companies such as the Zenith Radio Corp. and the Northern Trust Bank, where he spent 20 years, according to his campaign website.

Chlebek includes economic issues such as creating more jobs, tackling the “uncontrolled” national debt, and curbing taxes, as well as social issues that place more of an emphasis on seniors and veterans, environmental protection, and improving educational opportunities for young people as his priorities should he gain a seat in the U.S. Senate.

Matt Dubiel, a Naperville native, who owns and operates WCKG AM 1530, like Hubbard, prioritizes putting American first as a primary campaign priority.

He said in an online election questionnaire for Patch that he is running for the office to “represent the people of Illinois who want our economy, medical freedoms, schools and freedoms back,” Dubiel wrote.

Dubiel characterizes himself as the only candidate with a solid grasp of all the issues facing the people of Illinois, from a family perspective.

Bobby Piton, a portfolio manager who resides in Geneva, describes his core values as being pro-life, pro-liberty, pro-freedom, and pro-free speech,” among others, including being in favor of building strong border security and a wall.

Piton is calling for a full national audit of the 2020 Presidential election and says, if he were elected, he would work to abolish the Department of Education and would also vote to strip lawmakers of their power if they vote for mask mandates and other COVID-19 restrictions, according to his website.

He characterizes himself as an independent thinker who would “emulate who God wants me to be as a U.S. Senator. According to his campaign website, Piton says, “I bring a skill set that the U.S. Senate has probably never seen.”

In describing Duckworth, he says the sitting Illinois U.S. Senator is “beyond corrupt…and evil.”

He also said as an expert in financial markets, he plans to completely audit “all of the books” and "look under every stone.”

Jimmy Tillman II, also considers himself another America First Republican, similar to the platform on which Trump ran.

The Chicago native characterizes himself as a conservative and patriot who believes that the U.S. Senate is the key to unifying America.

“Re-establishing an America First policy, his website says, is the key that will “save our country from the forces trying to divide us,” his website says.

Tillman, who is the son of former Chicago Ald. Dorothy Tillman and musician Jimmy Lee Tillman hopes to use name recognition and his tenacity to place himself at the top of Tuesday’s primary election.

Tillman closely aligns himself with Trump and the MAGA movement and considers himself the most conservative of the seven candidates seeking the office of Senator.

His website maintains that Tillman is well-known throughout Illinois as a “vanguard for constitutional rights, standing against the mandates on churches and supporting President Donald Trump’s America First policies.”

“(President Joe) Biden’s absolute failures on the world stage have endangered American security, reduced America’s credibility and standing, and weakened the world in extraordinary ways,” Tillman writes on his website.

Chicago pastor Anthony Williams is also seeking the Republican nod in Tuesday’s primary. Williams says he has established himself as a strong community presence and says that the U.S. Senate needs to provide more than lip service to curbing gun violence in places like Chicago.

Williams has served his community as the pastor of King International Ministry United Church of Christ and has led a movement aimed at convincing politicians to create legislation that deals with the structural systems that cause violence, in hopes of shifting the conversation away from a focus on illegal guns and the "big business" of government-funded anti-violence charity organizations.

He also told Patch earlier this year that more needs to be done to address mental health issues.

"People's mental health is off the chain out here. We see it every day. This chaos has got to be addressed intelligently, or it's going to devour us. " Williams told Patch.