State Sen. Iris Martinez was leading the race for the Democratic nomination for clerk of the Cook County Circuit Court Tuesday night, setting her up for a possible showdown against Republican challenger Barbara Bellar to fill Dorothy Brown’s vacancy.
As of 10:45 p.m., with 88% of precincts reporting, Martinez secured 34.7% of the vote. She was ahead of Michael Cabonargi with 27.3%, Richard Boykin with 24.8%, and Jacob Meister with 13.3%.
The winner of the race will face off against Bellar, who ran unopposed in the November general election.
Reached by phone Tuesday night, Martinez said she was “keeping it positive” as results came in, but did not claim victory. Due to the coronavirus outbreak, she was forgoing an election night party, spending it instead with family and her team.
“We’re just playing by the rules,” she said. “We all have to be responsible. We have to celebrate with who we’re with.”
The clerk’s office has been criticized for its inefficiency and alleged corruption during Brown’s polarizing 20-year run. Federal authorities began investigating Brown in 2015 and secured convictions against two of her top aides for perjury and lying to a grand jury. She was never charged.
Brown, who is retiring with a full pension, announced last year that she wouldn’t seek a sixth term.
The clerk’s office maintains court records, processes fines and bail bonds, and employs about 1,400 people.
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Even though Brown recently digitized much of the clerk’s office, it still lags behind many suburban court dockets that are fully digitized. Each of the candidates said the current docket system is mismanaged, and laid out plans to modernize it.
Martinez, who studied public policy and administration at Northeastern Illinois University, is running on a platform to end the “neglect, mismanagement, and corruption that has plagued [the clerk’s office] for decades,” she told the Chicago Sun-Times Editorial Board in a written statement.
She made history as the first Latina woman to be elected to Illinois’ State Senate. She’s held the office for 18 years and is now the assistant majority leader.
The Democratic Party of Cook County put its support behind Cabonargi, who was endorsed by the Sun-Times. He amassed $700,000 in his campaign fund and put down $500,000 in TV advertisements, according to Crain’s Chicago Business.
Cabonargi, of Wilmette, is a Cook County Board of Review Commissioner and former prosecutor for the Securities and Exchange Commission.
Meister is an attorney and founder of a nonprofit LGBT rights organization.
Boykin, also an attorney, ran with the support of Brown’s base of African American church leaders, but failed to attain a winning coalition. He lost his seat as Cook County commissioner in 2018 after losing the favor of his party’s leaders when he voted against the soda tax.
