CTU denies – More than half of the 51 candidates for Chicago’s first fully elected school board are facing petition challenges, putting incumbents—including President candidate Hilario Dominguez—at risk of being removed from the ballot. The Chicago Teachers Union says it f
For weeks, candidates in Chicago’s school board race have been living with a familiar tension: not just campaigning for votes, but waiting to see whether a petition challenge could erase their name from the ballot.
This time, it’s even more widespread. A list posted by the Chicago Board of Elections Thursday—two days after the deadline to submit challenges—shows that nearly half of the 51 candidates seeking seats on Chicago’s first fully elected school board are facing contests to their candidacy. More than half are up against objections. meaning a substantial chunk of the field could be thrown off the ballot before Election Day.
Among the incumbents, the politically powerful Chicago Teachers Union is deeply intertwined with the contest. Hilario Dominguez. the CTU’s deputy political director who is running for school board president. is facing a challenge to his candidacy. So are three of the four other candidates for president.
The CTU’s stance adds a sharper edge to the dispute. The union—accused in the past of using petition challenges to kick candidates off ballots—says it did not file any challenges this year.
Jessica Biggs. a current incumbent representing parts of the South Side and the only non-CTU affiliated president candidate facing a challenge. portrays herself as independent. Meanwhile, Jennifer Custer is the only presidential candidate with a secure place on the ballot. Custer represents the Far Northwest Side. The CTU backed her in 2024, but she has since split from the union.
The scale of the ballot fights also sits against a changing backdrop in Chicago itself. The city is transitioning from having a partly elected and partly mayoral-appointed school board to one that is fully elected. In the 2024 election, when 10 seats were up for grabs, a slightly higher percentage of candidates faced challenges.
Inside that political environment, the CTU says it wants more access—not less. CTU officials said in a statement that they “want to see more people on the ballot. not less.” They pointed to the Supreme Court’s recent decision that effectively nullified a key part of the Voting Rights Act. saying that in that moment President Stacy Davis Gates did not want steps that could limit democracy.
To support candidates targeted by challenges, the CTU plans to provide legal support to candidates who don’t have lawyers. Responding to challenges often means hiring an attorney, which can be difficult for candidates running modestly funded, grassroots campaigns.
“CTU wants to see more people on the ballot, not less,” CTU officials said in the statement.
But the denial is not the end of the story. The CTU accused billionaire Michael Sacks and the Common Ground Collective, a super PAC he has poured money into, of backing challenges to CTU-aligned candidates and “attempting to restrict” civic engagement.
Chuck Swirsky. the executive director of the Common Ground Collective. rejected the union’s position in a statement. calling Davis Gates and Mayor Brandon Johnson “massive hypocrites who have no standing to comment on petition challenges.” He said they used the “CTU’s machine” to toss school board candidates off the ballot in seven of the 10 races in the last election.
Some observers speculated that the CTU was behind many objections in 2024. but Swirsky’s claim underscores how hard it can be to trace responsibility when objections are filed. Swirsky also alleged that the union tried—unsuccessfully—to change the state law that dictates how nominating petitions can be circulated at the tail end of the legislative session. “to cover up their failures gathering signatures.”.
The dispute over that proposed change has also drawn names and institutions into the argument. The Illinois Policy Institute. a conservative think tank. was the first to claim that the CTU was behind the proposed change. The CTU flatly refuted that accusation, saying the union did not write the proposal and did not support it.
Even within the current challenges, several allege that a CTU-backed candidate violated the part of elections law that state lawmakers were asked to change. The CTU, for its part, is betting that at least some of the objections will collapse under scrutiny.
CTU officials said they are confident in Dominguez’s signatures. They said he submitted three times the number he needed to get on the ballot.
Last cycle offers a reminder of how quickly ballot math can turn. In 2024, 27 of 47 candidates faced challenges. Some withdrew after objections were filed, and others were kicked off the ballot. By election day, only 31 candidates remained.
This year’s list signals a similar pressure point—except now, the number of affected candidates is larger, and the accusations around who filed what have become part of the public fight, not just a procedural footnote.
Chicago school board Chicago Teachers Union CTU petition challenges ballot Hilario Dominguez Stacy Davis Gates Brandon Johnson Common Ground Collective Michael Sacks Jennifer Custer Jessica Biggs Illinois Policy Institute