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Can Obama Save Alex Giannoulias, Pat Quinn in His Home State?

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CHICAGO -- President Obama bought breakfast on Sunday for the top of the Illinois Democratic ticket, Gov. Pat Quinn and Senate nominee Alexi Giannoulias, investing yet more time in two close contests in a state two years ago seen as deep blue. He'll get credit if they win and GOP taunts if they lose, because Illinois is his home. But once Obama took the risk of being in Illinois, he was in all the way.

Illinois Republicans are ending the longest general election campaign in the country -- the state's Feb. 2 primary was the first in the nation -- with Bill Brady positioned to become governor and Mark Kirk set to pick up the Senate seat once held by Obama. A PPP poll released Monday puts Kirk over Giannoulias, 46 percent to 42 percent, and Brady ahead of Quinn by five points, 45-40.

Just a few days short of the second anniversary of Obama's historic presidential election -- Nov. 4, 2008, capped off with a giant celebration in this city's lakefront Grant Park -- Obama came home on the final weekend of the midterm campaign to crank up turnout in the Democratic-vote-rich Chicago area.

alexi giannoulias, pat quinnThe breakfast (at Valois, a restaurant not far from Obama's South Side home) came after Obama headlined a get-out-the vote rally for Giannoulias and Quinn in a park flanked by the University of Chicago campus -- down the street from the law school where Obama once taught.

"Chicago, I need you to keep on fighting," Obama told those gathered at the rally. "Illinois, I need you to keep on believing. I need you to knock on some doors. I need you to talk to your neighbors. I need you to get out and vote in this election -- because if you do, if you're willing to step up, if you're willing to try, we won't just win this election. Pat won't just win this election. Alexi won't just win this election. But we will restore our economy. We will rebuild the middle class. And we will reclaim the American Dream for another generation and generations to come."

Asked about Democratic prospects on Tuesday, Obama said at Valois as he ordered pancakes, eggs and turkey sausage to go: "I feel great. We've got good turnout. Pat's gonna win, Alexi's going to win. That's why turnout is so important. We've seen a lot of enthusiasm, but it's going to be tight. These are close races. It's true here. It's true in Ohio. It's true in every state where we're competing. And obviously, the other side is enthusiastic. We've got to make sure our side is too."

While the White House was at first reluctant to embrace Giannoulias -- Obama and his team last year tried and failed to recruit popular Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan to run --the White House eventually embraced the nominee with gusto and delivered support for Giannoulias and Quinn, a longtime friend of White House senior adviser David Axelrod. When Obama won the presidency, no one thought replacing him in the Senate would be a problem for Illinois Democrats, but that was before former Gov. Rod Blagojevich was arrested on Dec. 9, 2008 and charged with trying to sell the Obama seat, triggering what may be the beginning of the end of an era of solid Democrat gains in Illinois.

The Illinois Senate contest is wrapping up as one of the closest in the nation, and Republicans from Day One have made it clear that winning the seat once held by the president was a particular prize -- as symbolic as the victory last January by Sen. Scott Brown, who claimed the seat long held by the late Sen. Ted Kennedy in Massachusetts.

Indeed, Illinois Republicans brought in Brown on Sunday afternoon for a get-out-the-vote rally targeting younger voters on Chicago's Near North Side and the Obama-saturated Chicago media. The day after the February primary, at an Illinois GOP unity breakfast, the recent GOP wins in Massachusetts and Virginia were used to fire up Republicans in Obama's adopted home state, with posters exclaiming, "Illinois is Next!"

"It's [Kirk] and you against the machine," Brown told a crowd at Joe's Bar. Kirk said, "If it can happen in Massachusetts, it's definitely gonna happen in Illinois."

A Giannoulias ally told me the White House team delivered everything they wanted: "They had no other choice. If Alexi loses, he wears the jacket one way or the other. So they got all the way in."

Obama made three visits to Chicago -- for two fundraisers for Giannoulias and the weekend rally and breakfast for Giannoulias and Quinn. First Lady Michelle Obama kicked off her political swing on Oct. 13, with her first stops in Milwaukee and Chicago, where she headlined a fundraiser for Giannoulias. The president and first lady also appeared in a Giannoulias ad.

Vice President Biden visited twice for Giannoulias; Education Secretary Arne Duncan also came home to help. Top White House staffers David Axelrod and Jim Messina also came to help Giannoulias, as did David Plouffe, who managed the 2008 Obama presidential campaign from its national headquarters here.

Obama also recorded robo-calls for Giannoulias and Quinn and a radio ad aimed at African American audiences. The White House also assisted in making sure Democratic National Committee money reached Illinois.

After its initial reluctance to embrace Giannoulias, Team Obama was all in. Said a Giannoulias ally, "If we pull this out, it is because the president, and the White House political team was flawless."

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5 Comments

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Delbert

cjjanis- Neither of the candidates Quinn or Giannoulias you think of so highly ran on their record here in Illinois. What should that tell you? Promises are easy, but their record of what they've done for the state tells more.

November 02 2010 at 6:19 PM Report abuse +1 rate up rate down Reply
Kenneth

I wonder If His trip to Illinois was a good idea on election day. his batting average for supported candidates is not the greatest. If I was either one of these two candidates I would want Obama as far away as possible as the old saying goes out of site out of mind. If anyone could have helped it would have been Bill Clinton. If their was that much support for Obama in his home state the polls would be a lot different. Losing an election like this in your home sate would be a true slap in the face. Especially when it was your old seat.

November 02 2010 at 3:32 PM Report abuse +3 rate up rate down Reply
1 reply to Kenneth's comment
prvn

I don't see the races in Illinois as a referendum on Obama so much as a criticism of the primary system, which produced the ultra-lightweight [and possibly ethically challenged] Giannoulias as the Dem candidate over at least two much more highly qualified candidates, including State Comptroller Dan Hynes, who would have breezed into the Senate in a general election. Much the same can be said on the other side of the aisle, where the Republican primary produced a Gubernatorial candidate [Brady] who is similarly 'light' [and possibly ethically challenged] while either of his primary opponents would have walked untouched into the Governor's mansion. In the olden days, when party bosses picked the candidates and told them when to run, this didn't happen as much. All politics is local and [very] personal. Few office holders have long coattails any more.

November 03 2010 at 12:53 AM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
Bigtimechillerm

When you vote remember your liberty and whether your vote will increase or diminish one citizens freedom over another. We Americans ought to find it detestable to confiscate OR command any citizen’s lawfully earned property to improve the condition of another. Soothe your conscience with your own sweat and treasure, ...I’ll do the same. Spend your vote though on liberty so that it increases, an equal benefit for all.

November 02 2010 at 10:27 AM Report abuse -1 rate up rate down Reply
writewing76

Let's hope and pray that Obama's poison to candidates he supports has the same effect in Illinois that it has elsewhere. Mark Kirk isn't a strong Republican candidate, BUT Alexi Giannoulias is pure corruption with an eye on furthering all of Obama's fiscally destructive policies. It's "Dumb and Dumber" on a political scale, but "Dumber" (Giannoulias) spouts the higher taxes, higher spending, everyone must suffer to make us all "equal" mentality that Obama has employed in his purposeful destruction of our country. It's tough living in a state that on a corruption scale of 1-10, is an 11. But anybody Obama supports should be avoided like the plague that he is to our American culture. His "Enemies" comment tells everyone exactly what he thinks of America. He's an outsider that is trying to destroy what the founding fathers labored to put together. The only hope for this democracy is clean sheet of paper thinking towards reaffirming what's in the Constitution.

November 02 2010 at 9:30 AM Report abuse +7 rate up rate down Reply
christierandall

I would not trust Kirk or Brady as far as I could throw them...they have both embelished on their backgrounds and Brady was involved in a real estate scandal. Quinn is clean and Alexi is being blamed for a failure of a family owned bank but he was just a loan officer and his older brother was the president and ceo. He is a good guy.

November 02 2010 at 12:19 AM Report abuse -12 rate up rate down Reply
2 replies to christierandall's comment
John Vilvens

Thar sounded nice but there is no one clean in this race. It is not who has not done something wrong but who has done the least wrong. Is there a none of the above on the ballot, because it is hard to pick the lesser of two evils.

November 02 2010 at 9:20 AM Report abuse +3 rate up rate down Reply
John Vilvens

Thar sounded nice but there is no one clean in this race. It is not who has not done something wrong but who has done the least wrong. Is there a none of the above on the ballot, because it is hard to pick the lesser of two evils.

November 02 2010 at 9:20 AM Report abuse +3 rate up rate down Reply

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