I just realized something, Jim Oberweis performed better against Durbin last time than Kirk did as an incumbent. Oberweis won DuPage too.
Lower turnout doesn't exclusively hurt Democrats. Can we stop with this myth?The past two midterms under a Democratic President have had low turnout and were disastrous for the party. If I recall correctly, 2014 was exceptionally low and the lowest in several decades. As for presidential years where turnout is higher, I'd only note that Democrats have now won the popular vote in 6 out of the last 7 elections.
As for DuPage County, turnout was 50% higher in this year's Senate election compared to 2010 and 2014. I think what made it worse for Kirk in the county was that the Senate vote total trailed the presidential vote by about 4k total votes out of nearly 430k. With the county swinging so much to Hillary and it being Duckworth's home base, Kirk was facing massive headwinds. I think what's also astonishing is that as recently as 2002, a Senate candidate candidate could win a massive statewide majority and still lose DuPage County by double digits. However, it's also worth noting that Durbin did much better in DuPage County in 2014 in a much closer race than 2002 when he was winning a landslide statewide.
