Voters in the 16th Illinois Congressional District must be happy with Adam Kinzinger. The Republican incumbent has no primary challenger, and Democrats fielded no candidate so far.
Kinzinger took 71% of the vote in the last General Election in this heavily Republican district. Democrats, who controlled the remapping process, packed the 16th with GOP voters to make the neighboring 17th District more Democratic.
As a result, Democrats are unlikely to win IL-16 even in a heavily Democratic year, according to Matt Streb. The chairman of Northern Illinois University's political science department also says national Democrats won't bother putting money into the district.
"There are other races where the Democratic Party is going to put money to defend those seats," he says, "rather than try to knock off Kinzinger, which is very difficult to do."
The situation is almost the opposite in the Democratic 17th District, where incumbent Cheri Bustos has the advantage in November. (She won 56% of the vote two years ago). Bustos has no primary opponent.
The Republicans vying for the right to challenge her are Patrick Harlan and Joe Boccarossa.
"Harlan probably has the advantage because he's the president of the Knox County Tea Party," says Streb, noting both candidates have similar platforms. "They don't want to fund Planned Parenthood, they want to eliminate the IRS, and they want lower taxes."
Whoever wins the primary will have an uphill battle against Bustos. "She's got almost $2 million in the bank right now," Streb says. "These guys have almost no money. Frankly, I'm not sure it matters who she runs against in November."
Tomorrow, Streb examines the Democratic and Republican primaries for the U.S. Senate seat held by Mark Kirk.