By Rick Pearson | December 14, 2025
(Chicago Tribune)
Two Democratic members of the Illinois State Board of Elections who helped block nearly $10 million in campaign fines against Democratic Senate President Don Harmon have political ties to organizations that contributed disputed, above-limit donations to Harmon and continued giving to him even as the case was pending before the board.
Vice Chair Rick Terven Sr., appointed in 2021, and board member Tonya Genovese, appointed in 2022, joined their two Democratic colleagues in October and November in rejecting penalties recommended by the board’s staff and an independent hearing officer against Harmon’s Friends of Don Harmon for State Senate campaign committee.
The board staff concluded Harmon violated state campaign law by collecting $4 million in unlimited contributions after fundraising caps he took steps to lift were reinstated, and they recommended Harmon’s campaign committee be fined $9.8 million. The action followed a Tribune inquiry to board officials about Harmon’s fundraising practices.
A hearing examiner later rejected Harmon’s appeal. Still, the financial penalty was not imposed because the eight-member state panel repeatedly deadlocked 4-4 along party lines, short of the five votes required for final action. On Nov. 18, the board voted 5-3 to strike the matter from its docket. A separate complaint filed by the Liberty Justice Center, a libertarian-leaning group that frequently advocates for Republican causes, remains pending and could bring the matter to court.
At the center of the dispute is a loophole in Illinois campaign finance law that Harmon helped author.
Although Illinois law generally limits how much money politicians can raise from campaign contributors, the loophole allows candidates to accept unlimited contributions when facing wealthy, self-funded opponents. But many politicians, including elected legislative leaders like Harmon, have long used it to contribute money to their own campaigns and artificially lift caps, thereby building large political war chests to help themselves and loyal members in individual campaigns.
Harmon triggered the provision to lift the campaign caps by contributing more than $100,001 to his campaign in January 2023. At the time, Harmon indicated that he thought it allowed him to accept unlimited contributions throughout the November 2024 general election cycle. But board officials told him the loophole would close after the March primary, meaning any campaign contributions he received after the primary that exceeded the donation limits were prohibited.
Harmon was not a 2024 candidate but is on the ballot next year and contended that an election cycle runs until his office is up for election. Unlike state House members, who are up for election every two years, state senators run in staggered two- and four-year terms…
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