Illinois Lt. Gov. Juliana Stratton, a Democrat, has won the race to succeed retiring five-term Sen. Dick Durbin (D-IL), defeating Republican Don Tracy, according to an Associated Press call on Tuesday.
Stratton, who served two terms as lieutenant governor alongside Gov. JB Pritzker, defeated Tracy, an attorney and former chairman of the Illinois Republican Party. With less than one percent of the vote counted at the time of the call, Stratton led with 70.6 percent to Tracy’s 28.1 percent. Whitfield Harrington Jr. of the American Constitution Party drew 1.3 percent.
Stratton’s win keeps the seat in Democratic hands as Durbin steps away after five terms representing Illinois in the Senate.
Record on Immigration Enforcement
Stratton has been outspoken on immigration policy. During a March 18 appearance on NBC’s Meet the Press NOW, she called for abolishing Immigration and Customs Enforcement, saying, “I’ve made it clear that I don’t think that this agency can be reformed.” She argued for redirecting resources toward “immigration judges and social services and community-based resources,” and said, “What does not work — and I don’t think anyone would say it does — is criminalizing our immigrant neighbors. That’s unacceptable.”
She also said that “ICE and CBP [need] to get out of American cities” and criticized placing ICE under the Department of Homeland Security, arguing the agency approaches immigrant communities through a “punitive lens” rather than focusing on “how we provide support and really get people on a path to citizenship.” Stratton called for a pathway to citizenship for DACA recipients and DREAMers.
On Redistricting
During an August 5, 2025, appearance on CNN’s News Central, Stratton was asked about Illinois Democrats holding 14 of the state’s 17 congressional seats, a topic raised after former Republican Rep. Adam Kinzinger said Democrats had redistricted him out of his seat and called mid-decade redistricting a “pure power grab.”
“We have competitive districts here in Illinois. And the reason why those competitive districts have gone to Democrats is because Gov. Pritzker and I have delivered big things for the people of Illinois,” Stratton said, citing work on reproductive rights, civil rights, jobs, and clean energy.
On Federal Deployments
In a September 1, 2025, appearance on CNN’s The Lead, Stratton accused the Trump administration of seeking to provoke unrest as a pretext for federalizing National Guard troops, saying the administration wanted to “come with this aggressive attack, see if they can provoke some kind of reaction, and then come back and say, later, well, this is why we need to now federalize national troops.”
Addressing federal immigration enforcement, she said agents were “snatching people off the streets and stuffing them into unmarked cars” with “no due process whatsoever.” She called for peaceful protest, saying, “We are seeing, not just the rise of authoritarianism, we are seeing it — we’re staring it, quite frankly, right in the face.” She added, “We are not going to roll out the red carpet for a wannabe dictator like Donald Trump.”
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