Jason Bunting of Livingston County has been elected to the Illinois State House of Representatives by Republican Party Chairmen from the 106th District which he will represent. The seat was vacated in January when Tom Bennett was elected to replace Jason Barickman in the Illinois State Senate representing the 53rd District.
Bunting told Cities 92.9 after being elected, “With Farm Bureau and Illinois Corn, that I was a State Director on, they allowed me the opportunity to go down there and advocate for agriculture and for the rural life style. I think we are going to do much of the same when we get down there. I have got some friends and familiar faces that are state representatives on the Republican side. We are going to get together, have a conversation and see where I can be of help.”
David Rice, Chairman of the 106th Legislative District Committee, the entity that elected Bunting, spoke well of him saying, “I like him very much as far as his energy. It seemed to be a theme among the other chairmen that he is high energy. He’s got working experience with legislation in Springfield with Farm Bureau work and various agriculture organizations that he has been chairman of or been a significant part of.”
Rice, who is also the Livingston County Republican Chair, continued, “So I think the chairmen all felt that he could step in and hit the ground running which is kind of what we are looking for with only two years to go and then of course wanting to have someone who is a good candidate for the 2024 election and can also help build the party back up.”
County Republican Chairs made up the 106th Legislative District Committee. Each had the number of votes that matched the number of people that voted in the Republican Primary in their county’s portion of the 106th district. Republicans were allowed to nominate the replacement for Bennett since Bennett is a Republican.
The 106th District is north and east of Bloomington. It includes the cities of Streator, Dwight, Chenoa, Fairbury and Gibson City among many others. The district covers parts of Ford, Grundy, Iroquois, LaSalle, Livingston, McLean and Will counties.
In addition to Bunting, other candidates that applied for the position were: Chris Balkema, Chairman of the Grundy County Board and a former candidate for U. S, House in the 11th district; Lyle Behrends, Iroquois County Board Chair and Iroquois Republican Party Chair; Susan Wynn Bence, an Iroquois County Board Member; Joshua Harris, County Board Member in Grundy County; Kristen Koppers, an author, educator and former candidate for Grundy and Kendall County Regional Education Superintendent; and Thomas Lynch, a former candidate for U. S. House in District Two.
The committee used an exhaustive ballot voting process which consisted of rounds of voting with the lowest vote getter being eliminated each round. All seven contestants were nominated.
In the first round Harris, Koppers and Lynch were eliminated with zero votes. Behrends won the first round with 13,990 votes.
In the second round Bence was eliminated with only 259 votes from Will County. Behrends still led with 13,990 votes.
In round three Balkema was eliminated having only 5,434 votes from LaSalle County. Bunting took the lead with 15,228 as Grundy County shifted its 8231 votes from Balkema to Bunting.
Bunting was elected in round four when Ford county pulled its 4,281 votes from Behrends, in a spirit of unanimity, and gave them to Bunting putting him over the 50% mark.
The event was hosted by the Horsch Radish Restaurant in Gibson City.
Sam Horsch, one of the co owners talked to us about his business saying, “We are doing a farm to table German restaurant. We are doing a whole mix of amazing foods that we get sourced from local farmers in this area. Being a sixth generation farmer myself, I really wanted to really make sure that we were connecting the different food farmers throughout here.”
“Our most popular entre is the Rahmschnitzel,” Horsch told us. “That is a creamy sort of schnitzel, And if you don’t know what schnitzel is that’s kind of like a fried meat. It’s breaded and pan fried . It’s a really delicious dish. We do it with pork.”
According to the menu the dish consists of “Tenderized pork cutlets, lightly breaded and pan fried. Served with a white wine mushroom sauce, bacon, and sour cream.”
Horsch continued, We also of course have chicken schnitzel. … And of course then we have got sausage samplers for anybody that would like that sort of thing because they are delicious and many of them are from right around here in Illinois.”
We decided to have “Sausage on a Bun,” since it was lunch time and had it with “Smashed Potatoes” on the side. Angie Lage, Front of House Manager, sold us on going with the Bavarian Sweet Mustard on our sausage. The sausage was raised and made locally at Kilgus Farms in Fairbury. Of course the food was delicious.
