ONE People’s Campaign is pleased to announce our dual endorsement of Senator Mike Simmons and Mayor Daniel Biss for the 9th Congressional District. Mayor Biss and Senator Simmons bring the fighting spirit and strong track record that this moment of crisis demands. In a crowded field of candidates, we believe the choice clearly comes down to these two progressive champions with extensive legislative experience and deep roots in the 9th district.
Mike Simmons has been a powerful advocate for working people and marginalized communities. As a state lawmaker, he has helped deliver increased state funding for violence prevention initiatives, helped preserve affordable housing buildings, such as the Leland SRO hotel, and advocated for legislation that calls on the rich and wealthy to pay their fair share to fund public services. Our members recognized his lived experience with many of the crises affecting our members, his leadership on critical issues such as housing and mental health, and his track record fighting for human rights and affordability.
Daniel Biss has been an effective champion for progressive causes across his roles as a state lawmaker and mayor. In the IL Senate, he championed the closure of a tax loophole used by hedge fund and private equity executives, and advanced bills to protect LGBTQ+ youth and abortion access. In Evanston, he converted publicly owned land into affordable housing, passed legislation to achieve zero on-site emissions from large buildings, and is investing in non-police crisis response systems. Our members recognized his long track record of supporting progressive policies, his strong relationships across the 9th district, and his ability to build effective coalitions to deliver meaningful change.
Our members carefully considered the crowded field of 17 candidates before arriving at this decision. Mayor Biss and Senator Simmons clearly set themselves apart from the field as the strongest candidates with both a bold progressive vision and deep experience in the district. Their track record and our experience with them as past endorsees makes us confident that they will champion issues we care mostly deeply about: affordable housing, community safety, universal access to healthcare and mental health services, addressing the climate crisis, fully and equitably funded public schools, immigrant justice, and investing in all of the above through increased taxes on the ultra-wealthy and large corporations.
Our members felt strongly that both Senator Simmons and Mayor Biss met the criteria for our endorsement. While we ultimately decided not to endorse a single candidate, the stakes of this race were too high for us not to share what we learned in this robust endorsement process. By endorsing both Mayor Biss & Senator Simmons, we encourage our members and voters across the district to narrow their decision in this crowded race to one of these two exceptional candidates.
ONE People’s Campaign will mobilize its volunteers to share our choices for the 9th Congressional District, as well as our endorsement of Sunjay Kumar in the 13th State House district race, with our neighbors and members. Through door knocking, phone banking and texting OPC will connect with voters about the issues they care about and share why our endorsed candidates will help us win the resources our communities deserve.
Join us for our canvass launch this Saturday at 10am-2pm at 4750 N. Sheridan, Suite 200 to help us talk to voters about the issues we care about and the best candidates to help us advance them – Sunjay Kumar (for state rep), and Senator Mike Simmons and Mayor Daniel Biss (both for Congress). First time volunteers are welcome and encouraged! We always start with a training. Snacks and lunch will be provided.
Here is how we arrived at this decision.
Our Chicago Political Committee identified this open primary race as a key opportunity to help elect a bold, progressive champion to represent us in Congress. In Summer 2025, we organized small-group meetings to get to know seven of the candidates who were running – those who we’ve worked with in the past or who were considered front-runners based on early polling or fundraising. We organized two meetings for our volunteers to hear back from those meetings and start discussing what is most important to us in this race. In October we issued our candidate questionnaire to those seven candidates plus the top fundraising candidates. Six candidates responded – Abughazaleh, Amiwala, Biss, Fine, Huynh, and Simmons. From there, our political committee invited Abughazaleh, Biss, Huynh and Simmons to participate in an endorsement interview with our voting-eligible volunteers.
Our endorsement policy requires that a candidate must receive 60% support in order to secure an endorsement. At the endorsement interviews, the attendees were evenly split between endorsing Sen. Mike Simmons and Mayor Daniel Biss – meaning no one achieved the 60% threshold. But it was clear from the meeting that we wanted to participate in this open primary and that there were two candidates who stood out the most to our membership. In a subsequent vote, 72% of the people who participated in the endorsement session supported issuing a dual endorsement. Our board approved the recommendation for a dual endorsement in order to reflect the top picks of our membership.