In the Race for U.S. Senate, the Choice Is Obvious: Normal Versus Radical

Don Tracy's platform is normal, dignified and respectable. Juliana Stratton's vision is radical, unmoored, dismissive of the Constitution, and indifferent to the rule of law

Don Tracy is not slick — he is sincere. He is not an ideologue — he is practical. He is not driven by some deep psychological longing to be loved — he is running out of a deep affection for Illinois, America, and for the principles of freedom, self-governance, and equality before the law which define our Republic.

Don is a man of many strengths, but in this tumultuous age of rage defined by social media gotcha gamesmanship, the most important personal quality to understand about him is this: Don is normal.

Normal in the sense that Don is practical, reasonable, thoughtful, respectful and courteous. Tracy is an old-school American, in the mold of Jimmy Stewart — the kind of guy we once approvingly referred to as “salt of the earth.”   Don is a good guy — his guiding principles are honesty, diligence, and decency toward others. 

Don understands the value of a dollar — and how many Illinoisans live looking for ways to make fewer dollars stretch to cover rising costs.  Don grew up the son of an entrepreneur who literally started the family business in a two car garage.  The Tracy family went without, and Don went to work for his dad, when Don was only 10 years old.  

The persistence and careful investment eventually paid dividends, as the family business garage startup grew over the ensuing 65 years into one of America’s top family-owned businesses.

Though Don helped the family business over the years, he did so from the outside as legal counsel. At the same time, Don built a successful law practice in Springfield at Brown Hay & Stephens, the oldest law firm in Illinois, and where a young attorney named Abraham Lincoln first practiced law.

It’s fair to say that Don is a huge fan of Honest Abe.  Like Lincoln, Don Tracy believes our nation is inherently great, but only so long as the people we choose to represent us are sincerely committed to serving the people and seeking practical solutions to real challenges without regard to party or personal advantage.

The Founders conceived of the Senate — the “upper chamber” in our bicameral Congress — as a calm, wise, and stable check on the passions that grip the populace from time to time that “will in general be composed of the most enlightened and respectable citizens … distinguished by their abilities and virtue, and in whom the people perceive just grounds for confidence.”

Don Tracy is the only candidate for U.S. Senate in Illinois who meets this lofty standard.

I do not know Lieutenant Governor Julianna Stratton and so will not speak to her personal qualities. It is instead her public persona which should disqualify her from the Senate.

First, Stratton has been running on the trumped-up, nonsensical narrative which depicts President Donald Trump as a Nazi and a threat to democracy who has to be “stopped” no matter what it costs. A central theme of her entire candidacy, Stratton’s primary campaign was epitomized by a a campaign commercial in which she has people repeating vacuously “F**k Trump!”

While there are, no doubt, rational grounds to disagree with President Trump’s policies or to dislike Trump’s approach to governance, making “F**K TRUMP” your main campaign slogan does not exactly reflect a calm, wise, or stable check on passions or articulate one's positions on the important issues now facing our country. 

It’s true that over 80 percent of Illinois Democrats do not want immigration law enforced in Illinois, and many of them believe assaulting federal ICE officers (which is of course a crime) is acceptable. So of course every Illinois Democrat candidate opposes President Trump’s policies.

Nevertheless, there is far more to being a senator than saying “F… You” to those with whom we disagree. And, in any case, President Trump will be out of office in two years (and a lame duck before then) — so what would a Senator Julianna Stratton be for or against during the final four years of her term after the end of the Trump presidency?

Stratton’s policy positions and policy proposals are extreme -- she caters to the activists within the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) who have co-opted the Democratic Party.  Stratton endorsed Michigan Senate candidate Abdul El Sayed. And, she declined to renounce former Maine Democrat Graham Platner’s actual Nazi tattoos or poor judgment until July, when Platner’s campaign was imploding and he was forced from the race.

A candidate who holds fringe positions on nearly every issue, Stratton supports eliminating employer and union-based healthcare and calls for replacing it with government-run “Medicare for all” — which would drive up costs, limit choices, and extend wait times and eventually destroy Medicare as we now know it.

Stratton has publicly advocated to abolish immigration law enforcement and she supports the pre-trial release of all but a few violent criminal defendants — which makes us unsafe.  

Stratton is opposed to voter photo ID — and backs statehood for Washington, D.C., and Puerto Rico for the purpose of adding four seats to the upper chamber — all four of which would certainly be held by Democrats. Furthermore, Stratton supports abolishing the filibuster and supports efforts to pack the U.S. Supreme Court to secure Democratic party rule. Nonetheless, she brazenly claims she will “protect democracy” if elected to the Senate.

Moreover, Stratton supports fully implementing the Green New Deal and completely phasing out carbon-based energy (including clean coal and natural gas power plants), which would drive high energy prices even higher.

If affordability, healthcare, public safety, and preserving democracy are your top issues, Stratton’s policies would drive up inflation, make you less healthy, less safe and lead to one party rule.

Worse, Stratton is the sort of modern oddity who cannot tell you what a woman is, supports biological males in women’s sports, and believes America is awful, not great.

So, Stratton is fully aligned with the Democratic Socialist’s seeking to take over the Democratic Party, not the majority of Illinois residents who reject Socialism and yearn for pragmatic solutions to our challenges. 

But, the reality is that she will really represent just one person in the U.S. Senate: Governor JB Pritzker, who plucked her from political obscurity, made her his running mate, and is now determined to buy a Senate seat for her too.

During the primary season, Stratton’s main opponent was another left-wing activist type, Congressman Raja Krisnamorthi, who was nonetheless enterprising and energetic — a self-made politician who raised well more than $30 million on his own to fund his ambition. Recognizing the threat Krisnamorthi posed to Stratton’s bid, Pritzker intervened thru a PAC and almost single-handedly blew Krisnamorthi away to promote his protégé. 

One can only speculate about why Governor Pritzker decided to invest well over $10 million to defeat a man of Indian extraction in favor of Stratton. 

Money plays an important role in politics — it’s how we amplify opinions and advance causes. However, when all the money comes from one person who is himself another ambitious politician, then guess what? This creates a “boss-and-stooge” dynamic in which the stooge votes as the boss directs.

Illinois needs a U.S. senator who will represent all Illinoisans, not just one billionaire boss. 

Don Tracy is that man.  

If elected to the U.S. Senate, Don Tracy will vote over his six-year term in support of common-sense, practical solutions to our problems.  Tracy has no desire to be a show horse or a TikTok dancing fool. 

Don will work across the political divide to support policies such as no taxes on tips, no taxes on overtime, and no taxes on Social Security payments.  He will support reducing barriers to investments in the U.S. to create more high-paying jobs, and to increase supplies of everything from food to energy to lower the cost of living.  

Don will support strengthening the border and use government power to promote opportunities for all Americans.  He will support a robust defense policy to avoid foreign wars. He will fight rampant fraud in social programs to ensure tax dollars are spent wisely and people in need are protected. 

Don Tracy will be the sort of representative in the Senate America's founders envisioned when they created the Senate.  He will be the sort of senator that Abraham Lincoln hoped he would be too — he is a man of the people who is for the people. He will be the senator next door, the normal neighbor who’s trying to build a better life for everyone in the neighborhood.

We could all do with less crazy and more common sense, less noise and more poise, less grift and more grace, less bull — and lower meat prices too.  

Don Tracy is an extraordinary man in so many respects, but his feet are on the ground and his head’s not in the clouds.  He will be a great U.S. senator, not because of  what sets him apart, but because of what makes him like most Illinoisans: He is normal in an age when normal has become rare in public life.

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Richard Porter is a retired attorney who was a partner at Kirkland & Ellis LLP. Prior to joining Kirkland and Ellis, Porter served as deputy assistant secretary for policy review and analysis at the Treasury Department, as special assistant to the president of the United States, and as executive secretary of the Domestic Policy Council.

Between 1992-'93, he was a counselor to the vice president of the United States. Between 2014-'24, Porter was the national committeeman of the Republican Party of Illinois.