Donald Trump Wins Illinois, Always Led in the Polls

By Dennis Robaugh and Tim Moran

Donald Trump won Illinois 38.8 percent of the vote, tallying 548,528 votes, in the March 15 Republican primary, compared to 30.3 percent for Ted Cruz, with 428,363 votes, and to 19.7 percent for John Kasich, 278,244 votes, with 99 percent of the votes counted.

Trump takes 49 delegates from Illinois, while Cruz takes nine and Kasich earns four.

Trump led the Illinois polls early and never gave up his lead.

“A lot of people who feel disenfranchised or underrepresented by the elite see Trump as not the great savior but as an outsider who isn’t going to be part of the establishment," David Shapiro, professor of political science at St. Xavier University, told Patch Tuesday night. "Some (of his supporters) are more vocal and angry, but there’s a fair number who are just ordinary people and frustrated and dissatisfied with what they’ve seen.

“Some who feel they are ignored or neglected ... they see Trump as an answer to that. ... I think that’s a mistake, and (Trump) is not what they are hoping for.”

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In the early going, with 17 GOP candidates in the race, Trump's candidacy was seen as an effort at self-promotion and largely a joke candidacy. No one anticipated he'd last this long or amass this kind of support.

"One reason he is exceeding expectations is because the political experts don’t know what the expectations are in this case," Shapiro said.

Marco Rubio received less than 9 percent of the vote, with 122,206 casting their lot with the Florida senator. Rubio ended his campaign after Florida's early returns showed Trump with a commanding lead in his home state.

In his victory speech from Florida, Trump offered praise to Rubio for running his campaign and said he had a bright future. Trump acknowledged the divisiveness of his own campaign. Sort of.

"We have to bring our party together," he said. "We have to bring it together. We have something happening that actually makes the Republican party probably the biggest political story anywhere in the world."

Trump led in the Illinois GOP polls for a long while. In recent weeks, Ted Cruz started to close the gap. Could he move enough to deny Trump another state and more delegates? The tally late Tuesday proved to be a resounding "no."

Thomas Ogorzalek, a political science professor at Northwestern University, said Trump's polling in Illinois never wavered.

"Trump did about as well as expected based on recent polls in Illinois, and about as well as he has been doing in other states, about 40 percent. It's possible he got a very small bump from his non-rally in Chicago on Friday, but he had already led in every Illinois poll so far this year," Ogorzalek told Patch. "He did slightly better downstate than in the suburban collar counties that are the balance of power in the state."

Trump, Cruz and John Kasich spent time in Illinois in recent weeks stumping ahead of the March 15 primary. For the first time in a long while, the presidential primary in Illinois actually means something. And the candidates let people know they really wanted their vote.

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Cruz and his wife spent time in several strong GOP suburbs, including Homer Glen, Rolling Meadows and Glen Ellyn, as well as cities elsewhere in Illinois, such as Rockford and Decatur.

Cruz actually is the first presidential candidate to visit the central Illinois city — known for its soybean-scented air and famous as the original home of the Chicago Bears football franchise (aka, the Decatur Staleys) — since Ronald Reagan in 1980.

Cruz is hoping to capture the Reagan magic and halt Trump's apparent march to the nomination. Trump leads in the delegate count.

Kasich, the Ohio governor who's banking on a big win in the Buckeye state to put a chill in the Trump frenzy, also has risen in the Illinois polls in recent weeks. He made campaign stops in DuPage County.

On Sunday, Trump returned to Illinois but bypassed Chicago, where his Friday rally was disrupted and canceled.

Video of Trump fans throwing punches and screaming epithets, including racial slurs, at protesters was aired on national TV for days afterward. Instead, Trump visited downstate Bloomington and staged his gathering in a remote airport hangar.

The only candidate to drop in the polls is Marco Rubio, the Florida senator who by all appearances looked to be at risk in his own home state primary. Rubio is the preferred candidate of the Chicago Tribune, too, and his numbers started diving as soon as the endorsement was made.

The Real Clear Politics average of all Republican polls on the eve of this primary put Trump as the favorite by 6.5 points, with 36 percent of the projected GOP vote to 29.5 percent for Cruz, 18.5 percent for Kasich, and 13.5 percent for Rubio.

Even after nationwide criticism following his aborted Chicago rally last Friday, Trump's poll numbers here didn't budge. Leading Republican party figures, including the other candidates, have blasted Trump's bombast and antagonizing rhetoric for inciting his fans to act out and even throw punches.

In Chicago, organized groups of protesters gathered outside the University of Illinois at Chicago arena to protest his planned speech. Many managed to get inside the arena, too, and when confronted with a crowd of Trump foes, the organizers decided to cancel the speech. Frustrated fans lashed out at protesters who celebrated the fact Trump wouldn't speak.

In December, with a crowded GOP field, Trump's poll numbers in the Land of Lincoln put him at 30 percent support, followed by Cruz with 15 percent.