Ex-State Rep Sues State Rep, Gun Control Group Over Primary Campaign

SKOKIE, IL — A former Democratic state representative from Skokie filed a lawsuit against the current state representative from Skokie who defeated her in last year's primary election.

Denyse Wang Stoneback alleges that State Rep. Kevin Olickal, his Friends of Kevin Olickal committee and the Gun Violence Prevention PAC, or GPAC, conspired to defame her during the campaign.

According to a 49-page complaint filed last month, Stoneback lost reelection and suffered damage to her reputation as a gun control advocate as a result of false statements by GPAC and Olickal's campaign.

"Due to the harm these statements have done to my reputation, the distress the situation has caused me, the damages and harm I suffered, and the need to attempt to right a wrong and prevent it from occurring in the future, I felt compelled to file my lawsuit, pursue remedies available to me, and, at the same time, set the record straight," Stoneback said in a statement.

The allegations arise from Stoneback's June 2021 decision not to vote for a bill that tightened firearm restrictions because it did not make fingerprinting mandatory for Firearm Owners Identification, or FOID, cardholders.

That bill, the result of compromise in the Senate, ended up passing the House by a bipartisan vote of 75-40. But it cost Stoneback an endorsement from GPAC — which ended up giving her a "C" on its 2021 "gun safety report card."

Before the compromise, GPAC President and CEO Kathleen Sances had been texting Stoneback with messages like, "Yaaaaaas!!!!!!,” “Love it!” and “You are working it Girl! Love it," according to the complaint.

But during the 2022 primary campaign, Sances issued a statement saying Stoneback "failed her constituents by not voting for legislation that would have helped reduced the number of illegal guns in our state" and endorsing her opponent for 16th District state representative.

Stoneback's suit includes images of several campaign mailers distributed by GPAC and Friends of Kevin Olickal, which it says contain false statements.

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One says Stoneback "SAID NO to requiring background checks on gun purchases," one says she "refused to support universal background checks" and another said she "told grieving mother's who've lost their children to gun violence she won't support their legislation."

According to Stoneback's suit, GPAC and Olickal's campaign knew she has never voted against a piece of "gun safety legislation" — a term the complaint does not define.

"Indeed, the [Olickal, GPAC and Friends of Kevin Olickal] engaged in a campaign that completely deconstructed Ms. Stoneback’s history of gun safety advocacy and knowingly recast her as an opponent of gun safety legislation," her suit alleges.

"In fact, they engaged in a relentless bombardment of false statements about Ms. Stoneback that sought to and succeeded in destroying the reputation she built over nearly ten years of advocacy for gun safety and preventing gun violence."

Stoneback's suit claims she has lost income and "standing in the community" as a result of the campaign.

"In addition to the foregoing, Ms. Stoneback has suffered economic harm in the form of lost income as a state representative and the monies expended on her campaign," it alleges.

GPAC representatives referred questions about the suit to their attorney, Michael Kasper, who declined to comment on the suit. Stoneback's attorney did not return a message, and Olickal has not responded to a request for comment.

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Olickal defeated Stoneback by just 622 votes, but her complaint discounts the possibility that there may have been other factors besides the mailers that contributed to her 2022 election loss.

As Skokie Patch reported at the time, Stoneback faced during the campaign criticism for her decision to hire former Evanston Human Resources Division Manager Jennifer Lin — even though Lin had just been ousted amid an investigation into how city administrators handled reports of sexual misconduct and assault against women and girls working for the city's parks department.

Stoneback's husband, Dave, is a senior Evanston city staffer, indicating Stoneback was likely aware of the reason Lin was looking for work after she walked away from the city with a $50,000 payout due to a separation agreement with the outgoing city manager. Lin later landed a six-figure position as director of compliance for Cook County Circuit Court Clerk.

Fellow Democrats also criticized Stoneback for allegedly reneging on a campaign pledge to join the Progressive Caucus.

After losing the primary, Stoneback introduced the "Truth in Politics Act," which would have made it a class A misdemeanor to "knowingly or recklessly" communicate "any false or misleading statement" with the intent to affect an election or candidate.

The bill defined a "misleading statement" as anything that is "only partially true or distorts a true statement."

At the time, the outgoing state representative said misinformation was becoming an increasing problem in political campaigns, but declined to say whether she believed it to be a factor in her own defeat.

That bill, introduced in November 2022 Stoneback's time in office, died in the House Rules Committee after it attracted only nine co-sponsors.

As Patch previously reported, federal judges have struck down far narrower restrictions on political speech than those Stoneback proposed.

The First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution provides broad protections for political speech and protects expressions of opinion.

"In determining whether a statement is of an opinion, and thus not subject to a cause of action for defamation as a matter of law, courts consider the (1) precision of the statement, (2) verifiability of the statement, (3) literary context of the statement, and (4) public and social contexts of the statement," said Appellate Court Justice Mary Schostok, in a 2019 decision over alleged defamation during the Republican primary in McHenry County the prior year.

That decision found that statements calling a candidate "crooked" and "destroying the GOP with Chicago style sleaze" could be viewed as opinions but claims that he had a "secret taxpayer funded slush fund" and taken "taxpayer-funded vacations" were not constitutionally protected because they could be interpreted as statements of actual facts.

In a statement explaining why she filed her defamation lawsuit, Stoneback called on state lawmakers to pass her proposed Truth in Politics Act and sign on to observe the Code of Fair Campaign Practices.

"Undoubtedly many other candidates have faced situations similar to mine," Stoneback said.

"By shedding light on the facts, I hope others will join me in calling for these changes. Together we can take an important step toward improving the way we conduct political campaigns in Illinois," she said.

"I will not allow the unfortunate occurrences of the 2022 election to get in the way of progress and the work that needs to be done."