Illinois voters have gotten to know incumbent Democratic Gov. JB Pritzker through the darkest days of a pandemic, bouts of civil unrest and repeated clashes with President Donald Trump’s administration.

During a volatile decade for the state, voters have also grown familiar with Pritzker’s most frequent state-level foil: Darren Bailey, the fiery Republican farmer and former downstate legislator who’s trying to keep the focus on Illinois’ economic, education and public safety issues — and off his longtime support of Trump.

Next month’s general election grudge match pits a progressive governor downplaying his potential White House ambitions as he seeks a rare third term, against the hardline conservative who has taken up residence in the city he famously branded a “hellhole” before getting thumped by Pritzker four years ago.

Aiming for the role of conversation starter if not spoiler in the Illinois governor race is independent candidate Collin Corbett, a moderate millennial Republican strategist who defected from his party because he thinks there’s middle ground to be found between Pritzker and Bailey in the acutely polarized politics of 2026.

Pritzker back ‘on the reins’

Pritzker, 61, started checking a host of boxes on an ambitious legislative agenda soon after unseating Republican former Gov. Bruce Rauner and taking office in 2019, shepherding the legalization of recreational marijuana and raising the state’s minimum wage to $15 per hour.

The billionaire former entrepreneur and philanthropist also championed a $45 billion capital infrastructure upgrade plan, funded largely by the legalization of sports betting and expanding Illinois’ vast array of gambling options, including the introduction of a Chicago casino (Pritzker himself is a prolific poker and blackjack player who used to have a stake in Elgin’s Grand Victoria Casino).

A fixture on TV screens statewide with daily updates in the depths of the COVID-19 pandemic, Pritzker drew complaints from many business owners who said his closures lasted too long, but public health experts noted the state suffered fewer deaths on average compared to those that took a more lax approach.

Cruising to reelection by nearly 13 percentage points over Bailey in 2022, Pritzker went on to sign Illinois’ assault weapons ban and a series of laws bolstering the state’s’ status as a haven for abortion care, while the cash-strapped state has seen 12 credit rating upgrades from the near-junk status he inherited.

“Things were heading in the wrong direction in 2018 literally in every way you can imagine,” Pritzker told the Sun-Times. “We had to change the direction of the state.”

The Hyatt hotel heir with an estimated net worth of $4.2 billion dropped $65 million into his gubernatorial campaign this summer, pushing his personal tab over three campaigns past $400 million.

That’s not counting millions more that Pritzker has directed to fellow Democrats and left-leaning causes across the nation and at home, including $58 million he pumped into his most notable state-level loss: the failed 2020 effort to amend Illinois’ constitution allowing for a graduated state income tax.

This time around, Pritzker’s team is blanketing airwaves and the internet with ads reminding voters of Bailey’s strong support for Trump, his staunch opposition to abortion rights and his rejection of science that shows dinosaurs never coexisted with humans, as taught in curriculum at a Bailey-founded school.

“He’s ashamed of the positions that he’s had in the past, and he hopes that the voters won’t hold it against him, but we know he hasn’t changed,” Pritzker said.

“The difference between JB Pritzker in 2019 and JB Pritzker in 2026 is that I come into the next four years as governor as somebody who has his hands fully on the reins of the state, and is able to maneuver it in a way that I think is highly beneficial for our future.”

‘Completely different attitude’ for Bailey

Bailey’s campaign has presented a softer candidate compared to the one who unleashed a flamethrower on a supposed copy of the state budget in a 2022 ad.

This time, the farmer and former state senator from Xenia in southern Illinois is hammering many of the same themes as Democrats are nationwide: affordability, education and public safety.

But Bailey, 60, knows his biggest hurdle is making inroads with voters in Chicago area precincts where Pritzker racked up double-digit margins four years ago. Bailey moved into a South Loop apartment in April, not far from the downtown condo he rented during his ill-fated introduction to city voters in 2022.

“There’s more people that live in the apartment unit that [wife] Cindy and I stay in than in my hometown,” he said. “I’m seeing and meeting new faces every day, up and down the elevator.”

Those interactions indicate to Bailey that “It is a completely different attitude and atmosphere than it was four years ago,” he said.

“I don’t think Chicago and this area — I don’t think they were feeling the failures of the SAFE-T Act.
I don’t think they were feeling the financial burden four years ago. They’re feeling all of that right now,” said Bailey, who grew his political profile as a staunch opponent of Pritzker’s COVID-19 mitigations and masking mandates.

Complicating matters for Bailey is the fact that suburban voters who used to provide the lifeblood of the Illinois GOP have mostly rejected Trump. The president rallied alongside Bailey in 2022 and urged him to stay in the governor race following the deaths of Bailey’s son, daughter-in-law and two grandchildren in a helicopter crash last fall.

Trump has given another endorsement to Bailey, who has said he appreciates the White House support but quickly shifted the focus back to “the endless ways JB Pritzker has failed Illinois families over the last eight years.”

Bailey’s campaign has gone out of its way to flag his divergence from Trump on certain instances, including Bailey’s opposition to data centers that the president has said should be welcomed by local governments.

He entered July with about $128,000 in his campaign fund and has raised almost $300,000 since then, as megadonors have slowed investments in a state that has gone more than a decade without a Republican winning a statewide contest.

“I’m not standing here and touting the Republican Party,” Bailey said. “We have problems. Everything is broken in Illinois, and it needs to get fixed. But it needs a leader who will stand up and listen to everybody.”

Independent shocker?

Dissatisfied with the prospect of another Bailey campaign “telling people what they want to hear instead of actually presenting solutions,” Corbett collected 37,000 signatures to get on the ballot as an independent and put $500,000 behind his campaign.

The 40-year-old political consultant from Palatine positions himself a fiscal conservative who supports abortion rights and opposes much of Trump’s agenda, including the aggressive deportation tactics of Operation Midway Blitz.

But Corbett is just as quick to blast state budgets that have ballooned under Pritzker, whom he deems as “ego-driven” and “petty” as Trump.

They’re positions that wouldn’t have sounded far-fetched a decade ago for a Republican in the vote-rich suburbs that once served as the foundation of the Illinois GOP.

But it’s a middle-ground approach Corbett is hoping will catch on with more voters caught in a vacuum between establishment parties moving toward extremes.

“Independents are almost a majority in this country, and they almost double up the two parties,” Corbett said. “The vote percentage that I get is going to shock people.

“Our long-term goal is genuinely to create an independent movement in the state. There needs to be a space for people to be able to go where they can have a home again in our politics.”