Dan Lipinski all but skated his way to a seventh term in one of the midterm election’s most eyebrow-raising U.S. House races, capturing 156,819 votes. His Republican opponent, Arthur Jones, widely known for his neo-Nazi past, garnered an astonishing 56,649 votes in Illinois 3rd Congressional District race.
The former president of the American Nazi Party, Jones has called the Holocaust of World War II — where 6 million Jews were exterminated — a “fairy tale.” He hasn’t denied his Nazi past and in fact, says he’s proud of it.
Two years ago, seeing that Lipinski was run unopposed in the 3rd District, Jones tried to switch his plans from running for the U.S. Senate to the House of Representatives, but was thrown off the primary ballot for allegedly photocopying signatures on his nominating petitions. Jones did, however, endorse Donald Trump in the 2016 Presidential Election.
This time around, all of Jones’ filing documents were in order, although many who signed his petitions said they were unaware of Jones’ checkered Nazi past. Illinois Republicans failed to put another candidate on the primary ballot, allowing the former Illinois Nazi to run unopposed, guaranteeing him a spot on the 2018 ballot.
Jones looked at his vote haul and said he was heartened there were so many people who shared his views.
“They can’t say they didn’t know who they were voting for,” Jones told the Sun-Times. “You guys in the media made sure of that.”
Are there 56,649 white supremacists in the 3rd Congressional District? More likely it was an uninformed electorate and/or people who vote Republican no matter what, and every once in awhile accidentally vote for a Holocaust-denying, bigoted, wannabe fascist.
Illinois’s 3rd Congressional District includes sections of Chicago’s Southwest Side, and the south and western suburbs up to the Cook-DuPage border and a small part of Will County.
Here’s a breakdown of how the votes fell. All vote totals are unofficial:
Chicago
11th Ward: Lipinski, 8,547, Jones, 1,597
12th Ward: Lipinski, 1,950, Jones, 242
13th Ward: Lipinski, 12,758, Jones, 1,892
14th Ward: Lipinski, 3,775, Jones 656
15th Ward: Lipinski, 1,442, Jones, 126
16th Ward: Lipinski, 698, Jones, 53
18th Ward: Lipinski, 2,219, Jones, 282
19th Ward: Lipinski, 11,836, Jones, 3,860
20th Ward: Lipinski, 175, Jones, 7
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22nd Ward: Lipinski, 1,593, Jones, 170
23rd Ward: Lipinski, 9,374, Jones, 1,810
65,062 votes were cast in the 3rd Congressional District. Lipinski collected 54,367 votes in Chicago, to Jones’ 10,695, per the Chicago Board of Election Commissioners.
Suburban Cook County/Townships
Berwyn: Lipinski, 1,900, Jones, 406
Cicero: Lipinski, 1,690, Jones, 298
Lemont: Lipinski, 4,923, Jones, 3.557
Lyons: Lipinski, 25,679, Jones, 8,197
Orland: Lipinski, 13,276, Jones, 8,173
Palos: Lipinski, 11,337, Jones, 5,488
Stickney: Lipinski, 7,131, Jones, 2,152
Worth: Lipinski, 19,329, Jones, 6,226
In total, 126,653 ballots were cast in suburban Cook County’s 3rd Congressional District race. Lipinski collected 85,265 votes (71%) to Jones 34,497 votes (28.8%), according to the Cook County Clerk’s Office.
Will County
Lipinski, 18,198
Jones, 11,576
Write-ins, 605
Source: Will County Clerk
DuPage County
Lipinski, 331
Jones, 176
Source: DuPage County Election Commission
Photo: Art Jones at a 2016 rally. | Campaign site