In Senate run, Juliana Stratton touts progressive politics and a pragmatic record

CHICAGO - In last spring’s hotly contested Democratic primary for Illinois’ open U.S. Senate seat, Juliana Stratton positioned herself as the progressive fighter ready to take on not just a Trump administration that’s targeted her state, but politics as usual.

That was evident during a live debate on Fox Chicago in February, when Stratton and her two top opponents, U.S. Reps. Robin Kelly and Raja Krishnamoorthi, sparred over how high to increase the federal minimum wage, which remains at $7.25 per hour.

Like many Democratic candidates this cycle, Stratton attacked the Trump administration’s economic policies and shared how residents felt "everything is too expensive." She then clearly stated her position: a $25 minimum wage.

In response to a follow-up question about how small businesses could handle such a stark increase, Stratton pointed to her record serving alongside Gov. JB Pritzker, who, with large Democratic majorities in the state legislature, passed a gradual increase of the state’s minimum wage to $15 per hour. She said they included small businesses in discussions about the change, and would do so at the national level.

Her opponents both said they supported a bill to get to a $17-per-hour floor nationwide. Krishnamoorthi said he worried a $25 rate would curtail hiring by small businesses. Kelly said Democrats needed to be "realistic" and work toward what could actually pass in Congress.

Stratton seized the opportunity to separate herself. She pointed out that the bill her opponents supported would increase the minimum wage to $17 by 2030.

"People can’t wait ‘til 2030," Stratton said. "If there’s gonna be a $17 an hour federal minimum wage, it should happen tomorrow, but here we are talking about what might be realistic. Well, what’s not realistic is expecting people to not be able to put food on the table, not being able to save for their future, not being able to give their children what they need." 

She added that Illinoisans told her about their desire for "leaders who are going to Washington with bold ideas" and who will be "courageous to fight for them."

To be sure, even if Democrats retake control of Congress, the chances of a $25 federal minimum wage passing with a Republican president are likely slim at best.

Yet, Stratton’s forceful stance appeared to play well in a political era when many Democratic voters have been frustrated with the party’s inability to defeat Trump in 2024 and combat his agenda through the first two years of his second term. 

That Senate primary battle would see huge sums of money spent, including about $10 million Stratton’s campaign received from Pritzker, a billionaire heir to the Hyatt Hotel fortune. With that help, Stratton would go on to win the primary with a commanding 40% of the vote.

Now, she stands in prime position to defeat her general election opponent, Don Tracy, the former chairman of the Illinois Republican Party, and head to Washington in January as only the state’s second-ever Black female senator.

Yet, even as her more combative style appears to be meeting the political moment, Stratton, 61, has also touted a decades-long career as an attorney, mediator and politician who’s had to work across a large and diverse state to tackle the big issues of the day. Interviews with observers and allies who have worked with her reveal Stratton’s abilities both as a political athlete and as a pragmatist with experience well-suited to handling the fray of the national stage in Washington.

‘The real deal’

It was a decade ago when Stratton decided to take on a 14-year Democratic incumbent state representative over his votes siding with Republicans during the battles between GOP Gov. Bruce Rauner and longtime State House Speaker Michael Madigan.

Rep. Kenneth Dunkin’s vote against restoring cuts to social service programs for older residents infuriated his fellow Democrats in Springfield.

Stratton, a native of Chicago’s South Side, had been caring for her mother, Velma, a former teacher who had been dealing with Alzheimer’s disease.

"I got really angry, and I yelled at the television," she said earlier this year in an interview with Liz Minnella. "I said, ‘Somebody should run against my state representative,’ and I didn’t know it was going to be me, but it did turn out to be me."

Stratton already had a long résumé in law and public policy. She graduated with a bachelor’s degree from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and then got her law degree from DePaul University. She went on to practice mediation as an attorney, headed a Cook County government advisory council on criminal justice reforms, and served as director for the Center for Public Safety and Justice at the University of Illinois at Chicago.

Still, as a neophyte politician, she had to play the game, which meant seeking support from sitting elected officials.

That meant speaking with State Sen. Mattie Hunter, whose district included the House district Stratton was running in, and who had deep ties to her opponent.

Hunter, who has served in the General Assembly since 2003, said she remembers Stratton introducing herself in hopes of earning her backing. The senator said she did not immediately jump on board with Stratton because she was something of a mentor to Dunkin, but she too was baffled by his votes against their party.

"I felt that I could work with him," Hunter said of Dunkin. "But at some point, things had gotten so much out of control. He didn't listen to me."

So, Hunter decided to support Stratton’s campaign in the Democratic primary.

"It was time for a change," Hunter said.

Along with a key endorsement from none other than President Barack Obama, Stratton trounced Dunkin by a more than two-to-one margin. She was unopposed in that fall’s general election and was headed to Springfield.

Dunkin did not respond to requests for comment on that race.

When she came to the state capitol, Stratton said she wanted to "hit the ground running," and passed several bills even as a freshman legislator.

"I just had so much energy," she told the "In My Own Words" podcast last year. "I was fired up, and I was like ‘I don’t know how long I’m going to be here,’ because you have an election every two years."

Stratton said her history working on public safety issues drove her work as a lawmaker. One of the bills she got passed in 2017 banned police booking stations on school property. She said she learned such stations were only present in CPS, which has largely Black and Latino students. Rauner, a Republican, signed the bill into law.

It was that energy and ability to learn the ways of Springfield to get her bills passed, even with support from Republicans, that impressed Hunter in those early years.

"She was, in my opinion, the real deal actually," Hunter said.

That’s perhaps why, just a few months into her career as a lawmaker, Stratton took a meeting with Pritzker, who at that time was starting his campaign for governor to challenge Rauner in 2018. Pritzker impressed Stratton by coming to her community on the South Side and asking about the interests of her constituents. 

Stratton said she very much appreciated Pritzker’s interest, but did not at first suspect he was thinking about asking her to be his running mate for lieutenant governor. Still, she made her desires clear if she were to take the role.

"What I told him was, ‘I’m honored,’" she said on "In My Own Words." "I don’t want to take on this role if it’s only to do the things that you don’t want to do."

Stratton said the future governor told her he wanted her to be a "full partner" and to pursue the interests she had.

Pritzker and Stratton won the 2018 primary and ousted Rauner later that year.

Illinois as a ‘blueprint’

At her swearing-in ceremony in January 2019, Stratton talked about William and Margaret Stephens, her great-great-grandparents, who were born enslaved and eventually freed with the signing of the Emancipation Proclamation. She spoke of their experiences farming their own land and establishing a community in what is now Stephensville, Mississippi.

While she spoke of her own family background, Stratton pointed to the lessons she learned from her ancestors about building their community. Their story revealed something about how she would approach governing in a large state with a diversity of viewpoints.

"Community building is done when we refuse to let our narrow self-interest be the sole guiding force, and instead, put them on hold long enough to listen to someone who has an opposing idea," she said. "To break bread with someone whose circumstances seem vastly different than our own and to commit to working side-by-side, even when it’s hard, to make life better."

With a new governor, the Democratic majorities in the General Assembly got to work passing a slew of progressive laws and programs, from the legalization of recreational marijuana, to a $50 billion infrastructure program, the codification of abortion rights, and, of course, that minimum wage hike.

There was, predictably, criticism of the Pritzker-Stratton administration’s record, like over the large increase in the state gas tax to pay for those infrastructure improvements, the measures taken to combat the COVID-19 pandemic, and the passage of the SAFE-T Act, which abolished cash bail, among many other criminal justice reforms.

Meanwhile, Democrats in the state legislature were marred with ethics scandals, up to and including the indictment and eventual conviction of Speaker Michael Madigan for corruption. Republicans have argued that the Democratic majority has yet to seriously tackle ethical reforms in state government.

But Democrats kept winning across the state, in part due to gerrymandered legislative districts, and Pritzker and Stratton won a second term in 2022.

In her role as lieutenant governor, Stratton tackled several issues, but said the broad theme of her work was "justice." 

For instance, she’s led the Restore, Reinvest, Renew, or R3, program, which aims to direct nearly $300 million toward Illinois communities historically impacted by the War on Drugs, what Stratton called a "classic example" of restorative justice.

Stratton also led initiatives to diversify the state’s agriculture workforce and introduce opportunities in the industry to young people in urban areas. She’s spoken about building a "bridge" between Illinois’ urban and rural communities, something that has seemed ever more difficult as residents in central and southern Illinois tend to vote overwhelmingly for Republicans while the much more populous Chicago area remains solidly Democratic.

Still, Stratton has argued that her and Pritzker’s record in Illinois could be the "blueprint of what can be accomplished" at the national level.

Great expectations

If elected to the U.S. Senate, Stratton would become only the sixth Black female member in the body’s history, and only the second from Illinois.

The first Black woman to serve in the U.S. Senate was Carol Moseley Braun, who is also a Chicago native and attorney who served at multiple levels of government. Moseley Braun was an early supporter of Stratton, largely because of her willingness to "speak truth to power," something she thinks is missing in the modern Democratic Party, which she described as too "timid."

"We don't want more wusses," Moseley Braun said. "We don't want people who just go along and get along."

But the former senator emphasized that Stratton won’t be alone, as two other Black women are serving in the upper chamber: Angela Alsobrooks of Maryland and Lisa Blunt Rochester of Delaware.

"Hopefully, now there are three Black women, and she won’t have to deal with a lot of the nonsense that I did," Moseley Braun said.

Notably, Moseley Braun didn’t support one position that Stratton and other more progressive Democrats have pushed for recently: getting rid of the so-called "filibuster," a Senate procedural rule which essentially requires 60 votes to pass any controversial legislation, instead of just a simple majority. Both parties have used the rule to prevent the other from passing major bills.

Democrats like Stratton have argued that if they win a majority, and potentially the White House in 2028, they should be able to pass the agenda their voters support. 

But others advise a more cautious approach, because when power eventually swings back to Republicans, Democrats won’t be able to easily block their legislation.

Dick Simpson, a professor emeritus at the University of Illinois Chicago and former Chicago City Council member, said Stratton’s professional background, interest in a wide array of policy spaces, and experience through nearly two terms in a statewide office have likely prepared her well to be a U.S. senator.

"I think there's a reasonably good hope that she can perform well in the role in the Senate because of the scope of preparation for understanding the state and caring about the people of the state," Simpson said.

He added that he considers Stratton a more "moderate" progressive, and not actually a firebrand like Bernie Sanders, the democratic socialist senator from Vermont.

In fact, when asked directly by Fox Chicago about campaign attacks from her general election opponent accusing her of aligning with the growing socialist movement among Democratic candidates, Stratton was again direct.

"I'm not a socialist," she said. "I'm a proud Democrat. I've been a Democrat my entire life."

So what are her goals for when she heads to Washington? Especially if Democrats win back power in Congress, Stratton said her first months in office will be focused on being a check on the Trump administration.

"I see this president as the most corrupt president that this nation has ever seen, and so, no, I’m not looking to find ways to work alongside him," she told Fox Chicago.

Campaign rhetoric aside, Illinois’ other U.S. senator, Tammy Duckworth, who also endorsed Stratton in the primary, expressed her confidence in Stratton’s potential. 

"What I would tell Juliana is to make alliances across party lines. There are still, to this day, as partisan as it has gotten here, there are still Republicans that I work with and have passed legislation with," Duckworth said. 

She added, "You can still find people to work with. You just have to find the right people across the aisle, and invest the time and energy into building up some of those relationships."

In a country seemingly as divided as ever, it’s advice Stratton has proven she’s able to apply.

Despite taking more progressive positions in her campaign, Simpson said politically, Stratton is a good fit for Illinois and will be able to navigate politics as it is in Washington.

"She's just been around government just enough to be pragmatic about [how] you got to actually make it happen, not just give a stump speech," he said.