Illinois Loses African-American Senate Seat

With help from GOP Senate nominee Mark Kirk, Illinois could go red in 2010.

Or Alexi Giannoulias could help the Prairie State stay blue.

But one color is sure to change: Black.

Two white candidates are now competing for a senate seat that has been held by a black politician for 11 of the last 17 years.

Carol Mosely Braun occupied the seat between 1993 and 1999. Barack Obama held it between 2004 and 2008, and Roland Burris took it over in 2009.

If Harold Ford Jr. doesn’t win his primary fight against Kirsten Gillibrand in New York–Ford is polling behind the upstate Democrat–the United States Senate will once again be peopled entirely by anglo-saxon men and women.

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