¶ The election victory was reported by WTTW, Capitol News Illinois and ABC7 Chicago. She succeeds outgoing Senator Dick Durbin, who is retiring after 30 years in the Senate.
¶ In Kane County, Stratton received 62.86 percent of votes cast for candidates, according to figures from officials explicitly designated as unofficial, while Republican candidate Don Tracy received 35.65 percent. The third candidate, Whitfield Harrington Jr., received 1.49 percent, and voter turnout in the county was 58.28 percent.
H2 Vote counts and the background to the election
WTTW reported on election night that Stratton had 61 percent with 85 percent of votes counted. Capitol News Illinois recorded only 73 percent counted on election night, with Stratton also at 61 percent there. Capitol News Illinois put her lead at around 788,000 votes, with more than 1.8 million votes cast. It was the first Senate election in Illinois without an incumbent since 2010, when Republican Mark Kirk won the seat previously held by Barack Obama. Stratton had previously competed in the Democratic primary against members of Congress Raja Krishnamoorthi and Robin Kelly; Governor JB Pritzker supported her in that race.
In comparison: Black women in the Senate
With her victory, Stratton will become the sixth Black woman in the US Senate, according to WTTW. According to BlackNews, this comes more than 30 years after Carol Moseley Braun's election in 1992 as the first Black woman to the chamber. According to BlackNews, the list also includes former Vice President Kamala Harris and former Senator Laphonza Butler. The sources differ on the year: Capitol News Illinois gives 1993, while BlackNews gives 1992. According to Capitol News Illinois, Stratton will also be the fourth Black person and the second Black woman to represent Illinois in the Senate. According to BlackNews, citing PBS, Stratton is expected to serve alongside Senators Lisa Blunt Rochester and Angela Alsobrooks from January 2027, which, according to that report, would mark the first time three Black women have served in the Senate simultaneously. This statement is supported by only one source in the fact sheet. Several media outlets, including WTTW, Capitol News Illinois and ABC7 Chicago, consistently report that, with Stratton alongside Senator Tammy Duckworth, Illinois will become the first state with two women of color serving simultaneously in the Senate.
From parent council to Senate: Stratton's path
According to her official biography, Stratton grew up on Chicago's South Side, and her first elected office was as a parent representative on Kenwood Academy's school council, which she later chaired. She studied at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and DePaul University's College of Law. According to BlackNews, she was first elected to the Illinois House of Representatives in 2016. She joined Governor Pritzker's ticket and became lieutenant governor in 2018; both were reelected in 2022. According to BlackNews, she will bring eight years of experience in the state's executive branch to the Senate.