Three Democratic Lake County incumbents held leads over their Republican challengers in election returns Tuesday, including the race for state’s attorney.
In the race for the county’s chief law enforcement officer, State’s Attorney Eric Rinehart led GOP challenger Mary Cole. In the county coroner contest, incumbent Democrat Jennifer Banek led challenger Mark Symonds, and Erin Cartwright Weinstein led challenger Carla Wycoff in the race for Circuit Court clerk.
Rinehart, who was elected state’s attorney in 2020, is seeking his second term in office in perhaps the most high-profile county race. He had about 54% of the vote compared to 46% for Cole, according to unofficial results posted late Tuesday night.
Rinehart ran in 2020 as a reform candidate and stood on that record in his re-election bid. During his first four years, he unveiled an initiative to combat gun violence that he said he had reduced homicides in Lake County. He also was a vocal proponent of the Safe-T Act, one of the few prosecutors in Illinois to publicly support the law that eliminated cash bail, among other measures.
Rinehart said Tuesday night he believed he would win although there was still about 15% of the vote left to be counted.
“We’re very grateful to the voters for giving us another four years,” he said.
He said his campaign showed that candidates could discuss broader criminal justice issues and seek more effective ways of balancing fairness issues while keeping the community safe.
His opponent, Cole, is a private practice attorney who formerly worked as an assistant state’s attorney who said she resigned “in disgust” after Rinehart was first elected. Cole said she would remove politics from the state’s attorney’s office if elected.
In the coroner’s contest, Banek led Symonds by about 16 percentage points. If the result holds, Banek will win her second term in office, following her election in 2020.
Banek is a nurse anesthesiologist and Army reserve officer who said she ran for office initially because she felt a duty to serve her community. In her first term, Banek said she focused on working with other government agencies to focus on ways of reducing preventable deaths, including from drug addiction.
Her opponent, Symonds, is a funeral home owner and operator, who said he would focus on ensuring that grieving families were treated with compassion. He also said he wanted to focus on drug overdose deaths and public education efforts.
“It looks promising and we’re excited about it,” Banek said Tuesday night as she held a substantial lead. “I think we ran a good race, but I think the most important thing was that we came into the office and tried to run it well from Day 1.”
In the circuit clerk’s race, Weinstein was the leading challenger by about 12 percentage points. Weinstein, if her lead holds, would serve her third term as circuit court clerk. Her opponent criticized Weinstein for a lawsuit that was filed by former circuit clerk’s employees.
