Daywatch: Illinois GOP leadership teetering
Good morning, Chicago.
The decision by top Illinois Republican officials to dethrone the party’s vice chair could portend even bigger changes for the moribund organization, including renewed efforts to replace its Illinois GOP Chairman Don Tracy.
Mark Shaw, the former chairman of the GOP in Lake County, lost the title of state party vice chair and also was removed from the party’s fundraising committee during a special meeting Monday of the Illinois Republican State Central Committee following controversies last month at the state GOP convention in Collinsville.
State GOP sources familiar with the inner workings of the state party said the events leading up to Shaw’s sanctioning also underscored long-standing concerns about the leadership of Tracy, a Springfield attorney who has headed up the party since February 2021. Tracy took no public position on whether Shaw should continue as state GOP vice chair and said he was powerless to force him to step down — a stance critics cited as weak. They also noted Tracy questioned whether Shaw was being fairly treated.
The party instability comes less than a month before the state’s 64-member delegation heads to Milwaukee for the Republican National Convention’s nomination of former President Donald Trump.
Read the full story from the Tribune’s Rick Pearson and Jeremy Gorner.
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