In April last year, Kim Foxx announced she wouldn’t seek reelection this November after two terms as Cook County state’s attorney. Now, others are stepping up to the plate to take her place.
Eileen O’Neill Burke will be on the ballot as the Democratic candidate after beating Clayton Harris III in the primary elections by less than 2,000 votes.
Bob Fioretti, who ran uncontested in the primaries, is the Republican candidate. Andrew Charles Kopinski is running as a Libertarian. Here’s what to know about each of the candidates in this race.
Eileen O’Neill Burke, Democrat
O’Neill Burke has spent more than 30 years as a defense attorney, judge and prosecutor. She worked as a Cook County assistant state’s attorney for a decade, where she served as supervisor in appeals and argued cases.
She was then a criminal defense attorney for about eight years, representing people in felonies, juvenile court and misdemeanor court.
In 2008, O’Neill Burke ran for trial court, where she served for eight years before getting elected to the First District Appellate Court in Cook County, a position she stepped down from last year to run for this office.
“I have been on every single side of the justice system. I have been in every corner of the courtroom, and I have seen the vantage point from every different angle that you can,” O’Neill Burke said. “I know what works and what doesn’t work, and that’s why I decided to step down and run for this office, because experience is needed right now.”
The main issues that O’Neill Burke is running on include removing guns from the streets, addressing the root causes of crime and rebuilding the State’s Attorney’s Office.
O’Neill Burke said Chicago saw 764 shootings this summer. She said many of these shootings weren’t with handguns, but with guns that have a switch and extended magazine, making gunfire harder to control. She favors an assault weapons ban.
“We can change the behavior, and we can change how prolific these guns are, just by enforcing the law,” O’Neill Burke said.
She also mentions supporting, but amending, the Safe-T Act, which Gov. JB Pritzker signed into law in 2021 and recently amended, ending cash bail in Illinois two years later.
But the Safe-T Act also changed the state’s attorney’s role in pretrial detention. Before the judge makes a determination, the state’s attorney needs to file a petition to detain. If they don’t, the judge can’t detain the defendant, even if they’re a serial killer, O’Neill Burke said.
“It’s become exponentially more important who the state’s attorney is and that they are implementing criteria, procedures and training for those people who are in the detention courts,” O’Neill Burke said.
If elected, O’Neill Burke promises to recruit for Cook County’s Restorative Justice Bureau, expanding restorative justice and deferred prosecution programs. These programs are a collaborative approach where the judge, state’s attorney and defense attorney work together to decide how to help those committing nonviolent offenses back on track.
“I’m a believer in these programs because I’ve seen them work,” O’Neill Burke said. “The recidivism rates are significantly less than those going through a regular felony trial call.” And restorative justice programs often cost a fraction of what it does to incarcerate someone, she said.
If elected, O’Neill Burke has also committed to creating a Choice Protection Unit at the State’s Attorney’s Office.
After Roe v. Wade was overturned in the Supreme Court in 2022, giving states the right to outlaw abortions, Illinois saw a 70% increase in abortions last year, including many where people crossed state lines to access the Cook County Health system – the largest provider of reproductive services to women in Illinois, according to O’Neill Burke.
With the influx of people coming to Illinois for abortions, “It’s not a question of if we are also going to have people coming here from out of state to interfere with those services. It’s a question of when,” O’Neill Burke said.
So, she has helped develop a task force of service providers, politicians and Planned Parenthood employees to discuss how to address ordinance violations like picketing, and criminal charges like stalking and harassment, plus legislation to prevent them.
O’Neill Burke said that restorative justice programs and a Choice Protection Unit will help the State’s Attorney’s Office to recruit law students for an office that is understaffed — mainly in the felony trial division, which Burke said is the most important division.
O’Neill Burke said she would triage the felony trial division to ensure those attorneys have adequate support. She would do this by inviting retired judges and state’s attorneys to come help train those attorneys.
Robert W. Fioretti, Republican
Fioretti said he’s running because the Democratic party’s philosophy has not helped the county’s crime rate.
“I thought it was time for somebody with strong leadership skills to bring that office in line,” Fioretti said.
Fioretti has worked as an attorney in Chicago for years. During Mayor Harold Washington’s administration, Fioretti was senior supervising attorney of the general litigation division for the corporation counsel.
In several cases, Fioretti has been appointed special assistant state’s attorney in Cook, DuPage and Will counties, as well as Illinois special assistant attorney general.
He’s been a part of more than 500 civil rights cases. His personal trial experiences have led to over 100 state verdicts, federal verdicts and appellate court decisions.
“I’ve tried cases in every courtroom in Cook County,” Fioretti said, including some in surrounding counties and throughout Illinois.
Fioretti also won the election to serve as Alderman of the 2nd Ward on the Chicago City Council in 2007 and 2011. And he served as 2nd Ward Democratic committeeman for two terms.
The first week of October, Rev. Jesse Jackson Sr. endorsed Fioretti for state’s attorney.
If elected, Fioretti said he’ll enforce the law as written.
“I’m not going to coddle violent criminals,” he said. He added that he’ll work with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement to remove immigrants who have committed violent crimes.
“The current philosophy in that office, and including for my Democratic opponent, is that the criminal defendant is the good guy, the police are the bad guys, and the victims don’t count,” Fioretti said. “I am definitely looking to change that and, at the same time, restore the rule of law and break the cycle of crime and corruption that we see is so prevalent.”
Fioretti also said he would also pursue politicians who participate in day-to-day corruption that passes as standard practices, bolstering the office’s investigative division. He said he’s been putting together a team of people working in investigative areas on how they take tips and follow up with leads.
Fioretti said he’ll help get illegal guns off the streets by working with law enforcement and organizations that are currently in place to prevent gun violence. To tackle the issue, he said he’ll meet with those in the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms, plus other federal and state agencies that address gun violence.
Regarding the Safe-T Act, Fioretti said that judges need more discretion when it comes to pretrial detention.
“Some of the crimes — such as aggravated battery upon a police officer, aggravated battery on an elderly individual, the illegal possession of a machine gun — are types of crimes that need to have detainable offenses,” Fioretti said, though they don’t currently under the Safe-T Act.
Like his opponents, Fioretti would also aim to increase staffing at the State’s Attorney’s Office, he said by welcoming back prosecutors who resigned from Foxx’s office.
“I’m going to stand up for victims and return professionalism to the State’s Attorney’s Office,” he said. “People will know where I stand, how we want to administer justice, how we seek justice for the victims in this county.”
Andrew Charles Kopinski, Libertarian
Kopinski has worked as an accountant, attorney, entrepreneur and real estate broker. His legal career has largely centered around transactional law involving real estate, asset protection and debt collection.
“Alarming trends in crime have shifted my attention and focus on criminal law,” said Kopinski, who is nearly finished with his associate’s degree in law enforcement and criminal justice at Oakton College in Des Plaines.
Kopinski said he decided to run to improve the decreasing quality of life resulting from crime in the area.
“Crime has spread out from certain high-crime areas,” Kopinski said. “Crimes such as carjackings and shootings are taking place in previously high-quality areas,” he said.
Kopinski said his biggest goal would be to decrease these crimes “to help significantly reduce violent crime and property crime in Cook County so that the people feel safer and more optimistic. They will want to continue to live and do business in Cook County.”
When it comes to the current state of the office, Kopinski has a list of things he’d like to change.
“The Cook County State’s Attorney’s Office is not working well, as evidenced by the high turnover rate and the increase in property crime in Cook County,” Kopinski said. “High-quality prosecutors, like those at the top of other professions, work hard and are determined to contribute to society to make it better by pursuing justice against criminals.”
Foxx’s soft-on-crime policies, he adds, are “demoralizing” for these prosecutors.
Although the Protect Illinois Communities Act, passed at the start of 2023, requires citizens to register assault weapons, Kopinski said he doesn’t think those who fail to do so should be prosecuted, according to WTTW.
According to his website, Kopinski opposes increasing penalties for gun possession.
When it comes to the Safe-T Act, Kopinski doesn’t support the elimination of cash bail. He said it sends the message that Illinois is soft on crime, and that a low bail should be instated instead.
Kopinski said that he also wouldn’t continue Foxx’s policy for shoplifting cases, which says that a felon must have stolen at least $1,000 of goods or have 10 prior convictions to be prosecuted. He said he would revert to the $300 threshold before prosecution.
Policies Kopinski supports includes creating opportunities to reduce prison stays, limiting or prohibiting police officers’ roles as School Resource Officers, reclassifying low-level drug offenses from felonies to misdemeanors, plus deprioritizing prosecution for cannabis possession, consensual sex work, and driving without an up-to-date license or registration.
Kopinski said he would engage with those he represents through online communication and town halls to ensure that he is held accountable.
“I will consider supporting reasonable reform proposals that promote transparency and lead to the implementation of best practices and evidence-based decision making, which will serve Cook County best,” Kopinski said.