When I think about the stakes of this moment, I think about the people who raised me.
I think about my mom. She spent her career as a nurse in the Rush University neonatal intensive care unit, working nights and weekends to care for the most vulnerable babies in the state. She was a single mother who poured everything into making our home feel warm — walls covered in family photos, the smell of her cooking on Christmas Eve. She made me feel like we had everything.
I think about my grandfather. He served as a sergeant in the Army, then came home and spent decades as a hardworking union steelworker, taking part in the postwar manufacturing boom. He grew tomatoes off the vine on our backyard fence and built me a playhouse with his own hands. He was my favorite guy in the world.
We were a middle-class Chicago suburban family — until we learned the hard way what that really means in America: that you’re one bad break away from everything falling apart.
For us, it came all at once. My mom was diagnosed with breast cancer. My grandfather’s heart disease worsened. The medical bills mounted. I still remember finding my mom sitting on the floor late one night, surrounded by piles of bills she had no idea how she’d ever pay — tears staining her face, a drainage tube still at her side from surgery just days before. The strongest person I knew, brought to her knees by a system that had failed her.
I was a kid. I couldn’t fix it. But I never forgot it.
That experience drove me into public service. I became a community organizer on the South Side, fighting for jobs and housing for hardworking people. Then I ran for the state legislature and helped pass an education reform bill that sent more resources to students in every corner of Illinois.
As deputy governor under JB Pritzker, I helped lead the effort to pass Rebuild Illinois — a $50 billion infrastructure package, the largest in our state’s history. It was about honoring union members like my grandfather and making sure there were still good jobs waiting for the next generation.
When I think about those families across Illinois staring at their own impossible piles of bills, I think about JB’s record and what it means for families like mine. He eliminated more than $1.1 billion in medical debt for over 500,000 Illinois residents. He lowered the cost of insulin. He won a $15 minimum wage. For people stretched thin and playing by the rules, every one of those policies has been a true lifeline. JB has been the leader who actually shows up for you.
In 2023, inspired by my grandfather’s service, I joined the Illinois Air National Guard as a commissioned officer. Every month, I head to Peoria for drills — serving alongside men and women from all across this state, many of whom see the world differently than I do. Together, we get some of the most sophisticated aircraft in the world up in the air and back safely on the ground. We show up, we do the work and we take care of each other.
This is the Illinois I know. And it’s a reminder I hold onto: that even in a country this divided, we are still capable of doing big things together. That the pen is in our hands. That the next chapter of this state, and this country, is ours to write.
It’s why I’m proud to be running as Pritzker’s lieutenant governor. Over the last eight years, JB has made Illinois a state where working families can actually get ahead, where hard work pays off in ways you can see and feel, and the deck isn’t permanently stacked against you.
I want to protect what we’ve built and take it further, until everyone who works hard and plays by the rules can rely on a system that has their back. That’s what my mom deserved. That’s what my grandfather deserved. That’s what you deserve.
Illinois is worth fighting for. JB has spent eight years proving it — showing up, every single day, for the families who need it most. Now I’m proud to stand alongside him and do the same.
Christian Mitchell is running to be the next lieutenant governor of Illinois. In addition, Mitchell is a captain and judge advocate in the United States Air Force, serving in the Illinois Air National Guard since 2023.
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