On January 11, Illinois state representative Rosemary Mulligan withdrew from the Republican primary ballot, in the face of a challenge to her primary petition. See this story. She will run as a write-in candidate in the Republican primary. She needs 500 write-ins. No one else is on the Republican primary ballot in her race, which is in the 55th district.
She has been in the legislature since 1992. In November 2010, she was re-elected with 67.6% of the vote. This example shows the absurdity of the idea that voter support for a candidate should be equated with his or her ability to complete a petition. It is very likely she will receive the needed 500 votes in the Republican primary to win a place on the November ballot. If she does not, the lone Democratic candidate will probably be the only name on the November ballot. Thanks to Ken Krawchuk for this news.
If Mulligan doesn’t get the 500 write-in votes, the Republican Party can still slate somebody after the primary. That slated candidate would need to pass petitions as well.
There is a misconception out there that she was thrown off the ballot. Thank you for clearly stating the truth – she “withdrew” her petitions. Why would she do that? Well, most of the signatures on her petitions DID NOT match the actual signatures of the voters. By “withdrawing” the petitions, she avoids the next step of actually checking in with live voters whether they signed the doc. That would mean several counts of forgery and fraud. The clear choice was to withdraw.