Ali Elkin/The Daily Northwestern
Despite the stormy weather, almost 40 students turned out Thursday for Student Night with Patrick Keenan-Devlin (Weinbergand Bienen’06), a former ASG president who is running to be the 18th District representative in the Illinois General Assembly.
The seat, currently held by Julie Hamos, will be vacated, as Hamos announced her bid to represent Illinois’s 10th congressional district.
Keenan-Devlin is running against four other candidates: Executive director of the Illinois Maternal and Child Health Coalition Robyn Gabel, former 6th ward alderman Edmund Moran and attorneys Jeff Smith (Weinberg ’77) and Eamon Kelly. All five candidates are Evanston residents.
Keenan-Devlin, 25, is the youngest candidate. The event, held at Keenan-Devlin’s office on Orrington Avenue, was intended to gain the support of NU students for his campaign.
“In local races, every vote counts, and every vote matters,” Keenan-Devlin said, citing the NU votes that have influenced local aldermanic elections in the past. “There are five candidates, so when you have that many candidates splitting the votes, a few hundred votes can really make a difference.”
After Keenan-Devlin introduced his platform to the audience, he fielded questions on subjects ranging from reforming Illinois’s income tax to reconciling his Catholic background with his pro-choice stance on abortion. Many students in the audience were freshmen or students who had worked on previous presidential or aldermanic campaigns.
Keenan-Devlin said he is also targeting NU students because he “has no money” and needs volunteers and interns for his campaign. He said the main concerns he’s heard from NU students involve financial aid and environmental issues.
SESP junior Samantha Reed, who is Keenan-Devlin’s student coordinator, helped market the event to NU students through Facebook and word-of-mouth, tapping into her previous experience as a community organizer on President Barack Obama’s campaign.
Reed said she has a personal stake in the election because the recent Illinois budget cuts have jeopardized the state-funded Monetary Award Program grants she uses to pay for school.
The issue of state funding for financial aid in the state representative race could impact NU students, said volunteer Xander Tapling.
“A lot of students going to NU rely on MAP grants and they’re due for a big surprise if people like Patrick don’t step up and help them,” the Weinberg freshman said.
Although NU students are not generally very involved in state representative races, Reed said NU students are a crucial voting bloc in the district.
“Students don’t really know who their state reps are, and a lot of them don’t think their Illinois state reps matter because Illinois’s not their home state,” Reed said. “But being at Northwestern nine months out of the year does make you a part of Illinois, and the government of Illinois affects your daily life.”
