IL-9 Congressional Race a Toss-Up

The question I’ve received the most in the last six months, “Who do you think is going to win the IL-9 congressional election?” — I honestly have no idea, and here’s why.

Jan Schakowsky has represented IL-9 since January 1999. The March 17, 2026 primary is the first open-seat race in IL-9 since then.

Before Schakowsky, Sidney Yates held the seat since 1949 (with a short break). Yates claim-to-fame is as the sponsor of 1958 Switchblade Act:

Vicious fantasies of omnipotence, idolatry… barbaric and sadistic atrocities, and monstrous violations of the accepted values spring from the cult of the weapon, and the switchblade knife is included in this. Minus switchblade knives and distorted feeling of power they beget — power that is swaggering, reckless, and itching to express itself in violence — our delinquent adolescents would be shorn of one of their most potent means of incitement to crime.

Ah, the halcyon days of the switchblade knife.

Yates was from the north side of Chicago (he’s buried in Skokie) and Schakowsky is from Evanston, so we (Evanstonian/Skokians) think of this as our congressional district. But after years of gerrymandering and a growing population elsewhere, Evanston and Skokie are a shrinking part of the District.

The District

IL-9 has a population of 753,677 people per the 2020 Census (that number was 653,600 in 2000!). It spans three counties in a weird panhandle shape from the lakefront all the way out to Crystal Lake, about 45 miles away.

A mere 13 years ago, it held a bit more of a sensible shape.

Here's where everyone in the District lives - this caught me by surprise.

The district is also 59% white, 15% Asian, 13% Hispanic, and 9% Black.

Who's Running

Fifteen Democrats and four Republicans filed for the primary. In a district rated D+19 by the Cook Political Report, the Democratic primary is where the action is at.

Democrats (in alphabetical order)

Schakowsky endorsed Daniel Biss in January 2026 and he is first on the ballot. Phil Andrew wrote a post for this blog a week ago.

The Polls: ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Two polls tell the story of this race, and the headline in both is the same: most voters haven't made up their minds yet.

A Data for Progress survey from early November 2025 (569 likely Democratic primary voters, ±4 points) found Biss and Abughazaleh tied at 18%, Fine at 10%, and everyone else in single digits. 31% were undecided — the largest bloc in the race.

Three months later, not much had changed. A Public Policy Polling survey commissioned by the Evanston RoundTable (501 likely voters, Feb. 20-21, ±4.4 points) had Biss at 24%, Abughazaleh at 17%, Fine at 16%, Simmons at 6%, Andrew at 5%, and Amiwala at 4%. 22% were still undecided, and as the Daily Northwestern noted, that undecided number climbs to 32% outside the North Shore state senate districts closest to Evanston. The further you get from Evanston, the less voters know about any of these candidates.

With 15 candidates splitting the vote and a fifth of the electorate uncommitted two weeks before election day, this primary is genuinely anyone's game.

Feel free to shill for your candidate (our yourself) in the comments, just be decent to each other.