Gryder Wins Republican Primary, Eyes Underwood's 14 District Seat: CNN

NAPERVILLE, IL — With 95 percent of the expected vote accounted for, Scott Gryder has been called the winner of the Republican primary for Illinois's 14th Congressional District race, according to CNN and the Chicago Tribune.

Five Republican candidates fought for a chance to unseat Democratic incumbent Lauren Underwood from her spot in the U.S. House of Representatives. Gryder will face the incumbent in the Nov. 8 general election.

The leading Republican candidate received 13,783 votes, or 30.9 percent, as of 4:45 p.m. Wednesday, according to totals from the Chicago Tribune. The roster of Republicans who vied to challenge Underwood included Gryder, Mike Koolidge, Jack Lombardi II, James Marter and Jaime Milton.

Underwood, who ran unopposed in the 2022 primary, was first elected to represent District 14 in 2018. She made history as the youngest Black woman to serve in Congress at age 32.

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The polls closed at 7 p.m. Tuesday throughout the state, except for six Cook County precincts that remained open an extra hour due to a delayed start.

Here's a look at the vote totals for each Republican candidate in the 2022 General Primary Election. (Unofficial results via the Chicago Tribune.)

• Gryder: 13,783 votes / 30.9 percent
• Marter: 10,785 votes / 24.2 percent
• Koolidge: 9,183 votes / 20.6 percent
• Lombardi: 6,278 votes / 14.1 percent
• Milton: 4,528 votes / 10.2 percent

Gryder has been elected three times to the Kendall County Board as a representative of District 2. He currently serves as chairman of the board. Gryder's platform focused on preserving Second Amendment Rights, improving access to mental health services, protecting Medicare and expanding services for United States veterans.

Marter, who came in second with 24.2 percent of the vote, has been elected to the Kendall County Republican Executive Committee twice and currently serves as chairman. He holds a pro-life, pro-family stance and ran to "preserve and protect the American Dream." If elected to Congress, he said he would have fought to cut spending, improve security, grow opportunities for Americans, protect freedom and unite the country.

Koolidge was formerly the host of the syndicated conservative radio program, "The Michael Koolidge Show." He retired from radio to make his bid for Congress. Koolidge served in the United States Army and graduated from Boston University with a degree in political science after studying via an Army ROTC scholarship.

Koolidge's platform promoted fighting inflation, funding the police, securing the United States border, cutting federal spending and letting parents have more of a say in their children's education.

Lombardi's "America First" platform had similarities to Koolidge's in that if elected, he planned to fight inflation, school choice for parents and strong borders. The entrepreneur said he would also support small businesses, religious freedom, the Second Amendment and American energy independence, among other things.

The only Republican woman running in the primary, Milton hoped to "defend our rights to Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness," her campaign website states. Keys issues in Milton's platform included protecting the Constitution, securing the U.S. border, reforming immigration policies and working to revitalize the becoming by supporting America First policies.

During her term in Congress, Underwood has held 91 community events, made 97 visits to local businesses and organizations, and held 35 town hall meetings between the seven counties she represents in the 14th District of Illinois. Since the start of the coronavirus pandemic, Underwood, who worked as a nurse before starting her political career, delivered more than $284 million in pandemic relief to K-12 public schools in the 14th District. Underwood has also helped pass legislation to limit underage access to e-cigarettes and to increase federal funding that supports child abuse prevention, her website states.

Prior to becoming a member of the U.S. House of Representatives, Underwood worked as a nurse while also serving as a special assistant/senior advisor and policy coordinator for the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.

Illinois is currently divided into 18 congressional districts — each represented by a member of the United States House of Representatives. November's mid-term election will be the last until the state loses a congressional seat in the 2022 midterms as a result of the 2020 census, according to CNN.

The 14th District covers a portion of northern Illinois spanning from the Wisconsin border to the north and Kendall County to the south. The district includes all or parts of Aurora, Batavia, Geneva, North Aurora and Campton Hills in Kane County; Oswego, Yorkville and Plano in Kendall County; Plainfield in Will County; McHenry, Crystal Lake, Huntley and Woodstock in McHenry County; Naperville and Warrenville in DuPage County; Sycamore in DeKalb County; and Wauconda in Lake County.

Since the district's creation in 1873, the 14 District representatives generally steered Republican — historically, only five of the 22 members have been Democratic. Underwood became the first woman to hold the seat when she was first elected nearly four years ago.