US Sen. Elizabeth Warren endorses Evanston Mayor Daniel Biss in crowded 9th Congressional District primary
Warren, a three-term senator from Massachusetts and briefly a front-runner for the 2020 Democratic presidential nomination, announced she was backing Biss in a statement shared with the Tribune in which she praised the two-term mayor as 'a relentless fighter for working people who can help deliver the structural change our country needs right now.'
'As Donald Trump and the MAGA Republicans continue to shred public services and rig the economy for the wealthy, we need progressive champions like Daniel in Congress to take on billionaires and powerful corporations, lower costs on essentials like health care and housing, and root out the corruption that keeps government working for the few instead of the many,' Warren said, referencing the president's 'Make America Great Again' slogan.
While the value of candidate endorsements is debatable, the nod from Warren could carry some extra weight as more than a dozen candidates vie for the chance to replace longtime U.S. Rep. Jan Schakowsky, an Evanston Democrat who announced in May that she would not seek a 15th term representing a district covering parts of the North Side, North Shore and northwest suburbs.
Schakowsky, like Biss, was among numerous Illinois Democrats who backed Warren for the party's presidential nomination in 2020. The senator dropped out less than two weeks before the Illinois' primary after finishing poorly in earlier state contests.
Biss, who campaigned for Warren in Iowa ahead of the 2020 caucuses alongside Illinois Treasurer Michael Frerichs and then-Cook County Commissioner Brandon Johnson, in a statement called her 'an inspiration to me and so many others as one of the most effective, boldest progressive leaders in our nation.' He said he was 'honored to have her backing in this race.'
'Senator Warren is a leader in this fight to take power from the billionaires and big corporations and put it back in the hands of the people, and I would be honored to work alongside her in Congress,' Biss said.
Biss, who just won a second term as mayor in Evanston in April, also has been endorsed by U.S. Rep. Sean Casten of Downers Grove and several current and former state lawmakers, including Rep. Kelly Cassidy of Chicago and Rep. Marty Beth Canty and Sen. Mark Walker, both of Arlington Heights, all of whom represent portions of the 9th District.
After eight years in the Illinois House and Senate, Biss ran unsuccessfully in the 2018 primary for governor, angling for the progressive lane in a race against now-Gov. JB Pritzker, a billionaire Hyatt Hotels heir, and Chris Kennedy, a wealthy scion of the Democratic Party's de facto royal family.
Coincidentally, Pritzker's first campaign for public office was an unsuccessful Democratic primary bid in the 9th District in 1998, when he finished third in a race won by Schakowsky, who's held the seat since winning the general election that fall.
A former assistant professor of mathematics at the University of Chicago, Biss was first elected Evanston mayor in 2021 and has supported the city's first-in-the-nation housing reparations program, while rankling some residents with his tie-breaking vote in 2023 to approve an agreement with Northwestern University for its new football stadium.
Among those also seeking the nomination in the heavily Democratic district are Biss' replacement in the state legislature, state Sen. Laura Fine of Glenview; state Rep. Hoan Huynh and state Sen. Mike Simmons of Chicago's North Side; progressive content creator Kat Abughazaleh, a newcomer to Illinois; and Bushra Amiwala, a board member in Skokie School District 73.5 who was one of the first Gen Z elected officials in the U.S.
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