With a narrowed field of candidates and less than a month until the Nov. 5 election, the race for 10 seats on Chicago’s new hybrid school board is heating up, as campaign donations pile in.
In the week following the major shake-up of the appointed Chicago Board of Education, state records show candidates for the elected school board seats have raised more than $800,000, a considerable uptick in recent months.
Voters will choose a board member to represent each of 10 new school districts on Nov. 5, after which Mayor Brandon Johnson will appoint 11 additional members, including the board president.
The past week’s haul brings the total raised in the race across the 10 districts since the start of the year to $2.3 million, according to records from the Illinois State Board of Elections. That sum includes loans and in-kind donations of things like staffing, food and event space.
In that same span, super PACs affiliated with school choice groups — the Illinois Network of Charter Schools and the Urban Center — are also spending big, logging $274,000 in spending in support of candidates in the past week, according to state records. Super PACs, also called independent expenditure committees, can raise and spend unlimited sums but cannot coordinate directly with candidates or donate to them.
This week’s numbers are only a small glance into how the races are shaping up: Campaigns have until Tuesday to file quarterly reports showing how much they have raised and spent — and how much they have left in the bank — heading into the home stretch of the historic election.
And, with weeks of turmoil over CPS leadership that resulted in the announced resignation of the current appointed school board and Johnson’s selection of a new batch of board members Monday, interested parties are likely to continue spending big in hopes of shaping Chicago Public Schools’ future.
The Chicago Teachers Union is by far the biggest contributor in this recent influx of donations, giving $372,000 in the past week alone to its slate of endorsed candidates, mostly through in-kind donations. Chicago Working Families, a group whose biggest donor is the union, contributed an additional $43,000 to school board candidates. The People’s 32nd PAC, whose funds are also primarily from CTU, has given $97,000 this past week.
Urban Center Action is a super PAC led by Juan Rangel, the former head of the UNO Network of Charter Schools — now known as Acero — that launched this summer. Its affiliated organization, The Urban Center, supports school choice and has endorsed a slate of “independent reform” school board candidates, all non-CTU contenders. Its super PAC has raised over $700,000 since July, with $164,000 already spent on text message and printing services for a handful of its supported candidates, according to state board records.
This is far from first race for the Illinois Network of Charter Schools, or INCS. The group has been involved in previous aldermanic and state legislative contests, largely backing pro-charter candidates.
In recent months, INCS’s super PAC received six-figure infusions from big-name donors like James Frank, founder of the automotive fleet leasing and management company Wheels Inc.; siblings and heirs to the Walmart fortune Jim Walton and Alice Walton; Netflix co-founder Reed Hastings; and Chicago investment firm giant Craig Duchossois, according to state records.
The school board race’s outcomes weigh especially heavy now, said INCS President Andrew Broy.
“There’s no better illustration of the need for a competent school board than what this board is doing right now,” Broy told the Tribune. “We need more sound governance on the board. The stakes are enormous in this election, and so our board and funders have decided to invest in these races to support mainstream, common-sense candidates.”
As CPS turmoil continues, education interest groups are anxious to position themselves as independent from the political feuds.
“We see it as investing in a process to yield a school board member (who is) independent, who thinks and puts student interest first and isn’t beholden to political interests,” Broy said when asked about INCS’s contributions and those of other major donors, like CTU.
The spending from the INCS Action Independent Committee and Urban Center Action were earmarked for text messaging and mailers for eight candidates in all districts except 2 and 5, the latter of which is uncontested with only CTU-endorsed Aaron “Jitu” Brown on the ballot.
The two super PACs have spent a combined total of $1.1 million in support of or opposition to school board candidates this year. Both groups also run regular PACs that can give directly to candidates, but are subject to state and federal limits on how much they can give.
And then there’s One Future Illinois, a pro-business PAC with ties to former Mayor Rahm Emanuel. It’s also expected to be a player in campaign donations for the race. As of Friday evening, the group had reported raising $52,400, according to state records.
Like INCS, CTU says its spending has been strategic in contested districts, with a focus on districts with schools that are under-invested in. In the race so far, the union has contributed the most to candidates in Districts 6, 8, 3 and 10 — Anusha Thotakura, Felix Ponce, Jason Dones and Robert Jones, respectively. Those four districts cover a wide swath of the city, including considerable portions of the city’s South Side.
“Underfunding and inequity in public schools has been the norm for the neighborhoods in Districts 10, 6, and 8,” a CTU spokesperson wrote in an email to the Tribune. “The candidates that we’ve endorsed in those districts …are all committed to transforming our schools and moving beyond ‘good enough.’”
But some candidates say voters are disaffected by the influence of major education interest groups, preferring candidates relying on self-funding and small-dollar donations. In the 2nd District, Bruce Leon, the founder of a human resources company, committed to fully self-funding his campaign.
District 10 candidate Che “Rhymefest” Smith, a rapper and songwriter who has in large part funded his campaign, says self-funding allows him to position himself as a candidate independent of major interest groups.
“From the people I’m speaking to, the parents, the organizations that we’re meeting with, the forums that we’re having, this constituency is more concerned about who they know, which candidate has showed up,” Smith said, adding that some local politicians’ endorsements have also been critical to garnering support for his campaign. “It seems as though this community is preparing itself to vote for the community candidate, not just the candidate (who) had the money bomb.”
Now, with the election just weeks away, contribution caps are off in all districts except 4 and 5, according to the Illinois State Board of Elections. This happens when a candidate contributes more than $100,000 to their own campaign or independent expenditures from a committee or individual exceed more than $100,000. Once that threshold is passed by any candidate in a district, all candidates in that district’s race can accept donations beyond the usual contributions limit. This means even more money is likely to come pouring in at the tail end of the race.
But, without CTU, INCS or other major groups bankrolling them in the wake of ballot challenges that ate up money in legal fees, some contenders for the school board couldn’t keep up. A few dropped off the official ballot and launched write-in campaigns over the summer, while others managed to secure enough funding to hang on.
Still, with the school board race being new to the city, it remains to be seen whether so-called independent candidates stand a chance.
“You’re at the bottom of the ballot,” Andre Smith, a candidate for the 6th District said of the school board race. “A lot of people are not even familiar with school boards. If you’re coming in with $30,000, $50,000, it’s not gonna work.” Smith described the expenses needed to get out mailers and other campaign materials in spread-out districts, pointing to how his district, for example, includes parts of 13 different wards.
And some, like Smith, are skeptical that making a name for yourself without a CTU or charter endorsement is nearly impossible.
“This race is only two players,” Smith, who is receiving funding from INCS, said. “CTU and special interests or charters. If you don’t have X amount of money (to self-fund), you can’t compete.”
Early voting began Oct. 3, and Chicagoans can cast their ballots now at one of two Chicago Board of Elections Super Sites, or at early voting sites in all the city’s wards starting Oct. 21. Chicago residents can also apply to vote by mail up until Oct. 31, or vote in person on election day, Nov. 5. Chicagoans can learn more about their district’s school board candidates at candidate forums taking place in their districts in the coming days.
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