U.S. District Court Judge Matthew F. Kennelly has set a jury trial date for Gonzales v Madigan, n.d., 1:16cv-7915. The plaintiff, Jason Gonzales, was a candidate for Illinois House of Representatives in the 2016 Democratic primary against incumbent speaker Michael Madigan. The district is 70% Hispanic. Gonzales charges that Madigan recruited two sham candidates to run in the same primary, both of whom have Hispanic surnames. All four candidates were then on the primary ballot, and Madigan won the primary.

Although this might sound like dirty but legal politics, in 1973 the Seventh Circuit ruled in a similar case, Smith v Cherry, 489 F.2d 1098, that such a dirty trick can violate the voting rights of the voters. It will be necessary for Gonzales to show that the two “sham” candidates had no sincere desire to run for the legislature.