Nearly 200 lawmakers convene at the Illinois State Capitol building in Springfield every year to craft bills, negotiate them with various interest groups and pass them onto Gov. JB Pritzker.
It’s a job often done in relative obscurity, and sometimes those lawmakers get a bad rap for how seemingly little they do.
But the Center for Effective Lawmaking, a nonpartisan think tank involving Vanderbilt University and the University of Virginia, identified those it says actually get things done.
Unsurprisingly, because of their legislative supermajorities, Democrats in the Illinois House and Senate ranked the highest on the researchers’ list of legislators’ deemed to be the most effective, with House Speaker Emanuel “Chris” Welch, D-Hillside, and Senate President Don Harmon, D-Oak Park, leading the way.
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House Democrats |
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| 1. | Emanuel “Chris” Welch | District 7 |
| 2. | Jay Hoffman | District 113 |
| 3. | Katie Stuart | District 112 |
| 4. | Anna Moeller | District 43 |
| 5. | Kelly Cassidy | District 14 |
| House Republicans | ||
| 1. | Tony McCombie | District 89 |
| 2. | Norine Hammond | District 94 |
| 3. | Charles Meier | District 109 |
| 4. | Daniel Swanson | District 71 |
| 5. | Amy Elik | District 111 |
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Senate Democrats |
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| 1. | Don Harmon | District 39 |
| 2. | Laura Fine | District 9 |
| 3. | Julie Morrison | District 29 |
| 4. | Ram Villivalam | District 8 |
| 5. | David Koehler | District 46 |
| Senate Republicans | ||
| 1. | John Curran | District 41 |
| 2. | Jil Tracy | District 50 |
| 3. | Chapin Rose | District 51 |
| 4. | Susan Rezin | District 38 |
| 5. | Thomas Bennett | District 53 |
While right-leaning, conservative Republicans occupied the bottom of the group’s lists, a few downstate Republicans bucked that trend, including state Sen. Sue Rezin, R-Morris.
“I’m all about trying to solve complex problems that affect everybody in my district and across the state,” she said.
The researchers assigned each legislator a score, determined by how many bills they introduced, how many were passed and, ultimately, how many were enacted by the governor during the 2023-2024 session of the General Assembly.
Rezin introduced 66 bills. A third of them got called up in a committee, and three were signed into law by Pritzker.
During the two-year legislative cycle studied by the group, Rezin was able to carry through a measure that she said, transcended party lines — a partial lift on a 1987 moratorium to construct small, nuclear reactors.
“It took a tremendous amount of education, but I’ve built up credibility with many people in the Senate and the House,” said Rezin, who has served in the state Legislature for 15 years. “It’s very helpful when you are trying to work and get large pieces of legislation passed in a bipartisan manner.”
Rezin said because Republicans comprise a legislative super-minority, it’s impossible for her not to work with Democratic colleagues.
Rezin said sometimes, she’ll even give a bill to a Democratic senator to increase its chances of getting passed.
“When I’m in my district, there’s no ‘R’ or ‘D,’” Rezin said. “As long as I can continue to make a difference and pass legislation with my colleagues … I’ll continue to do what I’m doing.”
Craig Volden, a University of Virginia public policy professor and co-author of the research, said there are many factors that contribute to a lawmaker’s “effectiveness” at getting bills passed, such as a legislator’s ability to work with members of the opposing party or their expertise in a certain policy area.
Being in the majority party did not guarantee a top spot on the list. For Democratic state representatives and senators ranked at the bottom, most reported only a handful — or even no bills at all — getting past the first committee.
“It’s not enough to just say, ‘Hey, I have this great bill,’ but then don’t do anything with it,” Volden said. “How do they build a coalition? Are they active in committee? Are they active on the floor? Some of those coalitions are bipartisan. Sometimes, there are some negotiations back and forth across chambers.”
After Welch, the top five House Democrats singled out by the group included Rep. Jay Hoffman, Rep. Katie Stuart, Rep. Anna Moeller and Rep. Kelly Cassidy.
On the House GOP side, the group identified the top five most effective legislators as House Minority Leader Tony McCombie, Rep. Norine Hammond, Rep. Charles Meier, Rep. Daniel Swanson and Rep. Amy Elik.
Among Senate Democrats, after Harmon, the group singled out Sen. Laura Fine, Sen. Julie Morrison, Sen. Ram Villivalam and Sen. David Koehler.
And the group’s top five Senate Republicans were Senate Minority Leader John Curran, Sen. Jil Tracy, Sen. Chapin Rose, Rezin, and Sen. Thomas Bennett.
Cassidy, a progressive Chicago Democrat, said her philosophy is to build coalitions.
Cassidy said she’ll have trouble convincing more-centrist Democrats to buy into legislation. One example was a measure removing barriers for a person to legally change their name, due to their gender identity. Cassidy said it took endless meetings with her colleagues in the House, as well as trans-rights activists.
“These are going to be really sensitive issues, and the most important thing we can do is to humanize them,” Cassidy said. “It’s really easy to ‘other-ize’ an issue and pretend that you’re never going to know somebody who’s directly impacted by it.”
Reyna Ortiz, a Chicago-based activist for transgender rights, said it took enormous work to move Cassidy’s bill.
“The process is so long, [the bill] was not coming out of committee. I remember screaming one year at Kelly Cassidy because I was so fed up. I just didn’t understand,” Ortiz said.
But she and Cassidy prevailed.
The experience “just taught me. I was, like, in school,” Ortiz said. “I was learning about building a bill … [we] built a beautiful relationship with Kelly Cassidy, and we’re very grateful for the work that she did put into the battle for trans women of color.”