Live blog: Dan Brady and Chris Koos declare victory in Bloomington and Normal mayoral races
Tuesday, April 1, is election day. Voters in McLean County will choose mayors, city council and school board members, township officials, and more. Voters here will also decide on a proposed 1% sales tax referendum that would support local schools.
Here's the latest reporting from the WGLT Newsroom. Tips or questions? Contact us at news@wglt.org.
Turnout jumps to 28% across McLean County
McLean County saw what appears to be a significant increase in turnout in Tuesday's election.
Turnout climbed to 28% of registered voters, according to preliminary data from the McLean County clerk's office and the Bloomington Election Commission. That 28% figure is a combination of voters in both election jurisdictions.
That's a notable increase from the average 20% turnout in prior mayoral election years.
Photos: Split outcomes for Chris Koos and Mboka Mwilambwe
Democrats sweep contested races in Normal Township
Democrats swept to victory in all of the contested races in Normal Township.
Krystle Able defeated Republican Chad Berck for township supervisor, with 60% of the vote and all precincts reporting. Current supervisor Jess Ray did not seek re-election. The role of township supervisor includes financial management of the Activity and Recreation Center [ARC] and two financial assistance funds which serve as a social safety net for residents in need.
Democrat Dayna Schickedanz defeated Republican Karl Sila for township clerk, also with 60% of the vote.
The four Democratic trustee candidates also won. They are Tanner Starr, Natasha Syed, Dylan Hile-Broad and Nayoka Griffis.
Jenna Kearns, Abby Scott headed for victory in contested Bloomington City Council races
Incumbent Bloomington City Council member Jenna Kearns appeared headed for re-election.
Kearns faced a challenge from Ben Zimmerman in Ward 1. That ward runs through the central part of the city, east and west. It includes both Miller Park and Mercer Avenue. Kearns won 57% of the vote.
Ward 9 had an open seat, with incumbent Tom Crumpler not seeking re-election. Abby Scott defeated Roger Bedeker for that seat, which represents much of northeast Bloomington. Scott won 58% of the vote.
Both Kearns and Scott won the endorsement of the McLean County Democrats, though these races are technically nonpartisan. The McLean County Republicans backed Zimmerman and Bedeker.
Voters approve school sales tax referendum
It appears that McLean County voters have approved the school sales tax referendum.
With all precincts reporting, the "yes" vote was leading with 53% of the vote, ahead by 1,988 votes.
The countywide sales tax, which a majority of Illinois counties have already adopted, will add a 1% sales tax on goods such as retail products, gasoline, and online purchases. The tax will not apply to things like groceries, prescription medications, and vehicle sales.
The millions of dollars in new revenue will be used for school facility improvements, as well as school safety and security, mental health support and other areas. Districts also promised property-tax relief if the referendum passed.
Dan Brady declares victory in Bloomington mayoral race; Mboka Mwilambwe concedes
Former state Rep. Dan Brady has declared victory in his run for Bloomington mayor.
Brady told a crowd of cheering supporters that "the victory belongs to all of us, but now the real work begins and that’s the work of governing. Let’s build a stronger, safer, more vibrant city together," he said.
Incumbent Mboka Mwilambwe has delivered a concession speech to his supporters.
Mwilambwe was seeking his second term. He is the first Bloomington mayor to lose re-election since Jesse Smart, in 1997. The three-term incumbent lost to Judy Markowitz, who became the city’s first female mayor and first Jewish mayor.
Lorenz: 'I'm not calling the race at this point'
Normal mayoral candidate Kathleen Lorenz is addressing her supporters in Uptown Normal as she trails incumbent Chris Koos with not many votes left to be counted.
"I'm not calling the race at this point," Lorenz said. She says it may be a gap they have to watch closely.
Lorenz, a Normal Town Council member, is thanking her supporters, colleagues and campaign team.
"I'm very proud of what we've done," she said. She reiterated her earlier points on running a clean and positive campaign. "We'll see what the rest of the night brings," she said.
'Yes' votes are leading for McLean County school sales tax referendum
Things are looking good for supporters of the McLean County school sales tax referendum.
Voting currently stands at 53.4% "yes" and 46.6% "no" with outstanding votes still to be tallied for both Bloomington and McLean County.
With over 15,000 "yes" votes already, voters in favor of the referendum more than doubled the 5,351 "yes" votes cast in 2014, the last time the tax was on the ballot. It failed that time.
Chris Koos declares victory in Normal mayoral race
Normal mayoral candidate Chris Koos has declared victory in his bid for a sixth term.
35 of 38 precincts have reported results as of 9 p.m. Koos is leading with 45.9% of the vote. He's leading Normal Town Council members and challengers Kathleen Lorenz (40.3%) and Chemberly Harris (13.8%).
Koos has been mayor since 2003.
Chemberly Harris concedes loss in Normal mayoral race
Normal mayoral candidate Chemberly Harris has conceded she'll come up short in the race.
With most of the vote counted, incumbent Mayor Chris Koos is leading with 45.9% of the vote. Town council member Kathleen Lorenz is in second with 40.3% of the vote. Harris was running a distant third, with 13.8%.
Dan Brady has the lead as more results come in
Dan Brady is off to an early lead in the race for Bloomington mayor.
Brady has captured 45% of the vote as of 8:50 p.m. Cody Hendricks is running second, with 35.3% of the vote. Incumbent Mboka Mwilambwe is trailing with 19.7% of the vote.
The mood is increasingly upbeat at Brady headquarters. Music is blaring through the speakers as a room packed with supporters cheer on the updated numbers.
Former state Sen. Bill Brady said the race appears to be sealed for Dan Brady (no relation).
“It’s early but it’s pretty clear that Dan has the support he needs to be our next mayor," he said.
Meanwhile, at Mwilambwe's party: “I think the mood is good here tonight. You know it’s pretty positive. It says zero of 60 precincts have reported. So I think we’re just going to be patient and see what’s going to happen. But, yeah, people are excited," Mwilambwe said.
The incumbent says he’s faced other election nights where things changed.
“You’re stronger in some areas more than others," he said.
Former city council member: Mwilambwe has done the job well
The mood at Mboka Mwilambwe's watch party Bonchon about 8:30 p.m. remains festive. People are mingling and enjoying a spread of appetizers and drinks.
Friends of the mayor from his Illinois State University ties, as well as the Congolese immigrant community, are intertwined with others from Bloomington-Normal that have filled the restaurant’s dining area to cheer on the incumbent.
Supporter and former city council member Joni Painter says people are hopeful.
“I really hope Mboka wins. It’s an important job, and he’s done it well," she said.
Painter calls Mwilambwe unique among the three candidates for running a nonpartisan race. She doesn’t believe the same is true of challengers Dan Brady and Cody Hendricks.
Junior Nsumbu of Normal and Pele Bomolo of Bloomington both originally hail from the Democratic Republic of Congo — like Mwilambwe.
Nsumbo said while he’s not a Bloomington resident he still wanted to come out and support his friend tonight.
Bomolo has known the mayor nearly his entire time of living in the Twin Cities — more than two decades.
“It’s early. We’re waiting, because we know he’s going to win.”
Watching the results with the Brady campaign
Here at the Dan Brady campaign watch party, McLean County Board member Geoff Tompkins says he’s known Brady for close to 20 years and has worked with him on multiple campaigns. But he says the city has three outstanding candidates and each of them has a lot to offer regardless of who wins tonight.
Jim Steakhouse is packed with well over 100 supporters.
Early vote and vote-by-mail results are in...
As expected, the first results of the night to come in are the early votes and votes-by-mail.
They show Bloomington mayoral candidate Dan Brady ahead with 45% of the vote over incumbent Mboka Mwilambwe (21%) and Cody Hendricks (34%).
They also show Normal Mayor Chris Koos ahead with 48.6% of the vote, ahead of Kathleen Lorenz (36.7%) and Chemberly Harris (14.7%).
The "yes" vote is also leading for the school sales tax referendum, with 57% of the vote. (You can track the school sales tax vote on WGLT's multijurisdictional vote tracker.)
But it's very, very early. Still so, so much vote to be counted.
Cody Hendricks, a teacher, touts the value of voting in local elections
Municipal elections and elections without a national component are known for low turnout. But for Bloomington City Council member and mayoral candidate Cody Hendricks, those local races are the ones that matter the most.
A high school civics teacher, his whole experience in politics starting with running for the Pekin City Council at age 17 was based around getting involved.
“Truly the way I teach my students … local elections are really the elections and individuals who can affect your daily life in so many ways," he said.
The issues facing mayoral candidates and the city — housing affordability, economic development, the tax base and infrastructure — aren’t issues directly addressed by national or even state leaders.
“We look at the president, who can make massive change in our community, but really when you get down to it, it’s your local township, your local city council, your local county board and mayors who ultimately affect your life," he said.
Chemberly Harris would be Normal's first Black mayor
A group of about 25 supporters has gathered at Savannah Green clubhouse for Chemberly Harris’ watch party, beginning with a prayer on how she “ran for a purpose.”
“I’m excited. I’m nervous,” Harris said as supporters settled in, opting to not keep too close an eye on the returns. “I want us to be in a place of celebration, because we put in a lot of hard work.”
Harris and her team ran a grassroots campaign, knocking on 15,000 doors and building a nonpartisan brand after previously running as a Democrat for the Illinois House. Harris said she met constituents who might not agree with her on every issue, but felt like she would fight for them.
“This was a lot more intimate,” she said. “I’m taking it all in that I was the people’s choice. It was individuals in this community who gave $25 and $50. We found ways to make those dollars stretch. But it gave us a sense of pride every time we stuffed an envelope."
Harris earned no endorsements and was out-fundraised by her opponents, including incumbent Chris Koos.
Win or lose, Harris is proud of the barriers she’s broken just by running. If she wins, she stands to become the first Black mayor of Normal.
“For every young girl who was expecting me to run and looked up to me, I couldn’t disappoint them,” she said. “I had to do this no matter what and fight no matter what. Win or lose, I made those young women proud.”
Kathleen Lorenz's supporters meet in Uptown
Normal mayoral candidate Kathleen Lorenz said around 7:45 pm that the mood among her supporters at Stave Wine Bar in uptown was good.
In reaction to the preliminary results, which show Koos leading with about 50% of the vote and Lorenz trailing with around 34% of the vote, she said she is not jumping to conclusions just yet.
"I work as hard as I possibly can on walking door to door," she said. "It's one of my most favorite things to do, and that interaction with the voters, I know, was all very positive."
She added that she knows there are many votes left to be counted.
"I am very proud of my team. I think we ran a very clean race, very open, transparent, ethical. We stayed positive. We stayed issue focused," she said.
Dan Brady team watches results at Jim's Steakhouse
Mboka Mwilambwe's campaign huddles at Bonchon
The mood is festive early tonight at Bloomington Mayor Mboka Mwilambwe's watch party at Bonchon on the city's east side.
Mwilambwe is running for a second term against challengers Dan Brady and Cody Hendricks.
Chris Koos campaign gathers in Uptown Normal
Normal Mayor Chris Koos and his supporters are gathered tonight at Medici in Uptown Normal as the results come in. WGLT is there too.
The Koos campaign sampled four precincts to get an early sense of the direction of the race.
Normal Town Council member Kathleen Lorenz, one of Koos' challengers, is hosting her watch party just down the street at Stave.
Chemberly Harris talks to her supporters
Normal mayoral candidate Chemberly Harris kicked off her election results watch party at the Savannah Green clubhouse by talking to her supporters.
Cody Hendricks supporters at the Castle Theatre
It's a packed house at the Castle Theatre for Bloomington mayoral candidate Cody Hendricks' watch party.
At least 80 supporters are mingling with music and dimmed lights. It feels more like an act is about to start than a political party.
Hendricks is making the rounds posing for pictures and chatting.
Hendricks and former state Rep. Dan Brady are challenging incumbent Mayor Mboka Mwilambwe in today's election.
It’s been awhile since a Bloomington-Normal mayor was voted out of office
If either Mboka Mwilambwe or Chris Koos lose tonight, it’ll be the first time in decades that a sitting Bloomington-Normal mayor has been voted out of office.
The last Normal mayor to lose re-election was Charles Spear, in 1968. Charles Baugh won that three-way race over Spear and Hal Riss Jr., by around 100 votes.
The last Bloomington mayor to lose re-election was Jesse Smart, in 1997. The three-term incumbent lost to Judy Markowitz, who became the city’s first female mayor and first Jewish mayor.
Both Koos and Mwilambwe are facing three-way races to win re-election. Koos is running for his sixth term as mayor of Normal, against challengers Chemberly Harris and Kathleen Lorenz. Mwilambwe is running for a second term against challengers Dan Brady and Cody Hendricks.
Open polling site in Normal remains slow as 7 p.m. close approaches
Normal First United Methodist Church is also experiencing low turnout early in the evening, with 41 total ballots cast since the polls opened at 6 p.m.
Carolyn Yockey, election judge for precinct 14, said this is despite having changed into an open polling place with a wider range of people eligible to vote there.
The church is on the north end of the Illinois State University campus.
“Voting machines have worked really well, but we haven’t had enough turnout for that to mean much,” she added.
She added November turnout at that location was also underwhelming at around 200 total votes cast.
Ballot processing running smoothly
McLean County Clerk Kathy Michael said election operations have been running smoothly so far.
Michael said two of the county's 81 precincts had a "minor glitch" processing ballots, but said those ballots were processing without incident on another machine.
Jeff Lord, election judge for precinct 10 and 29 in Normal, said current practices make McLean County elections more efficient. The county has transitioned away from paper ballots in favor of electronic voting.
Precincts also balance their totals every hour, a move Lord said he likes.
“Not all counties do that, and we've seen that in other counties or states or whatnot, when they have issues, they're not balancing every hour,” said Lord. “Those types of, what I call internal controls, I think are very positive, and it leads to a lot of integrity."
Michael said her office has fielded several calls about campaign signs outside polling places, which she said required election judges to make sure they are moved 100 feet away from the polling location.
Turnout slow to start election day
Election day turnout has been slow throughout the morning, according to McLean County Clerk Kathy Michael.
Michael, whose office oversees all elections in the county outside of Bloomington, said some areas have been especially slow in rural areas where there have been no contested races, but she said activity will hopefully pick up after lunch.
“You’ll see at the end of the day some areas with a 3% turnout because they didn’t have any contested races, and you’ll see something like Heyworth that may have a 35% percent turnout,” Michael said, noting Heyworth has a contested mayor’s race.
Michael said the voting center at the McLean County Government Center had 13 voters through the first five hours of the day.
At Wesley United Methodist Church in Bloomington, voter traffic was slow as about 40 voters had cast ballots through the first four hours of morning.
The Bloomington Election Commission has not posted updated vote-by-mail and early voting numbers. Executive Director Luke Stremlau said that will likely come after the polls close tonight.
How to follow the results tonight
Polls in McLean County will stay open until 7 p.m. tonight. After that, the vote counting begins.
There is no definite time by which we’ll know the results. Preliminary results (with all precincts reporting in) are typically available within a few hours of polls closing in most cases. Some races may be too close to call for WGLT (and too close for candidates to declare victory or defeat), meaning we’ll wait until the actual vote counts are officially certified by election authorities.
McLean County has two different election authorities, meaning there are two different places to follow election results. The Bloomington Election Commission’s results page will show the mayoral race and city council races. The McLean County clerk’s results page will show results for the Normal mayoral race and Normal Township contests.
Early votes and votes-by-mail will be counted first in both election jurisdictions. In McLean County, Clerk Kathy Michael cautions that unofficial results won’t be complete until all precincts are in — and ballots from the county's two voter centers (serving voters from multiple precincts) are tallied. Michael said the county’s results page will denote whether that has happened.
WGLT’s results tracker will combine results from both election authorities for the school sales tax referendum, because voters in both places will decide its outcome.
The races we’re watching closest today
There are a lot of races on the ballot today here in McLean County. Here are the ones the WGLT newsroom will be watching most closely as results come in tonight.
Bloomington mayor - Incumbent Mboka Mwilambwe is seeking a second term. He’s facing a challenge from current city council member Cody Hendricks and former state Rep. Dan Brady.
Normal mayor - Incumbent Chris Koos is seeking his sixth term. For the first time, he’s facing a challenge from two town council members: Chemberly Harris and Kathleen Lorenz.
School sales tax referendum - McLean County’s school districts banded together to ask voters to approve a new 1% sales tax to help fund things like facility improvements, school safety, and mental health services. In exchange, many districts have promised property tax relief if this is approved. The new 1% sales tax would apply to retail products, gasoline, and online purchases. It would not apply to things like groceries, prescription medications, farm equipment and more.
Bloomington City Council - There are two contested races. One is in Ward 1 (central part of the city), the other in Ward 9 (northeast Bloomington). In Ward 1, incumbent Jenna Kearns faces a challenge from Ben Zimmerman. Ward 9 is an open seat because Tom Crumpler is not seeking re-election. Abby Scott and Roger Bedeker are running for the position.
Normal Township - While most races on today’s ballot are nonpartisan, that’s not the case in Normal Township. Current township supervisor Jess Ray, a Democrat, is not seeking re-election. That led to a race between Democrat Krystle Able and Republican Chad Berck, plus several other Democrats and Republicans running together as a slate.
What will turnout be today in McLean County?
It’s obviously too soon to say what voter turnout will be for today’s municipal election. But recent history gives us some sense of what to expect.
Turnout (the percentage of registered voters who cast ballots) has hovered between 19% and 21% for the last four municipal elections in which the higher-profile mayoral races were on the ballot. That’s 2009, 2013, 2017 and 2021.
Of course, the rise of easy early voting (both in-person and vote-by-mail) is expected to impact the 2025 turnout. As will both communities having three-way contested races for mayor. But it’s still expected to be well below what we see during presidential elections, which is typically between 68% and 75% here in McLean County.
It’s Election Day! Polls are now open in McLean County
It’s Election Day, and polls are now open. Polls will stay open until 7 p.m. tonight.
You can find your polling place on the State Board of Elections website, using your ZIP code.
It’s not too late to get informed about what’s on the ballot. Check out WGLT’s Voter Guide to see our latest reporting on the key races and issues. You can also plug your address into the Vote 411 tool (maintained by the League of Women Voters) to see specifically what’s on your ballot.