Even as several state legislatures are working on plans that finally could reveal the eligibility status of Barack Obama to be president, a lawyer in Chicago is lining up a challenge to Obama's former chief of staff, Rahm Emanuel, as he contends for the office of mayor in that city.
"If I didn't think I was going to win, I wouldn't file the challenge," Chicago-based attorney Burt Odelson told WND, explaining the challenge he is preparing to file next week with the Board of Election Commissioners for the City of Chicago.
"Elections law clearly specifies that a candidate for mayor in Chicago must have been a resident of Illinois for at least a year before running for election," Odelson said. "Emanuel is a resident of Washington, D.C., where he lives with his wife and family, not Chicago."
Odelson, who has been practicing municipal and elections law for 38 years, cited Illinois state law regarding the qualifications for elective office, 65 ILCS 5/3.1-10-5(a), that clearly states, "A person is not eligible for an elective municipal office unless that person is a qualified elector of the municipality and has resided in the municipality at least one year next preceding the election or appointment."
Even Chicago insiders agree Odelson has a good case.
This Wednesday, in an article entitled "Will residency be the Rahmstopper," veteran Chicago reporter John Kass wrote in the Chicago Tribune that Emanuel was purged twice from the city voter rolls in the past 13 months, even though he was reinstated both times by election officials.
"If we don't win at the Chicago Board of Elections, I will appeal, all the way to the Illinois Supreme Court," Odelson told WND. "But I have no doubt I will win. Rahm Emanuel will never be on the ballot this year to succeed Mayor Richard Daley as mayor of Chicago."
Odelson estimated it might take him six weeks to two months to pursue his complaint, especially if he has to take the appeal all the way to the Illinois Supreme Court, but he insisted he was not boasting that he would win.
"I expect I will have a harder time arguing the case before the Chicago Board of Elections," he said, acknowledging the reality of Chicago politics. "But the law is clear and I will eventually win on appeal."
WND previously reported that Odelson argued President Obama is oddly more qualified to run for mayor in Chicago than is Rahm Emanuel.
"President Obama has a residence in Chicago," he pointed out. "Obama has not rented out his Chicago residence and he visits it regularly."
"This is a fact-sensitive determination," he stressed, "and as far as I know, Emanuel has rented his residence in Illinois since September 2009. He may be a property owner, but he is not a resident within the applicable definition of the Illinois code."
Odelson stressed that a person may own one or more home, but for legal purposes, a person can only have one official domicile under the law.
"Rahm Emanuel lives in the District of Columbia, not Chicago," he said. "The legal question of his eligibility to run for mayor of Chicago is as simple as that. Rahm Emanuel is not eligible."
He argued the case would be an easy one for the Board of Election Commissioners for the City of Chicago to decide, largely because Emanuel has not attempted the usual dodges to the one-year residency requirement.
"He hasn't rented a place in Chicago that he can claim is his residence," Odelson noted. "He isn't attempting to say he's living in his mother's basement or with friends in Chicago. This is not a hard case for me to win."
Odelson speculated Emanuel might try to qualify under a provision in the Illinois code that was passed in 1943 to prevent Illinois residents who were in military service during World War II from losing their status as Illinois residence while they were stationed overseas.
"Emanuel was not in Washington as a member of the military," Odelson said. "He leased his house on Chicago's North Side and he moved his family to Washington."
Even if Emanuel used an absentee ballot to vote in an Illinois election like the primary, the legitimacy of his vote could be called into question and that vote alone, even if somehow he was permitted to cast it, would not establish his residency to run for mayor, Odelson said.
On Nov. 13 Emanuel officially announced to a packed auditorium on Chicago's North Side that he planned to run for mayor in Chicago, according to an Associated Press report.
Emanuel is required to collect 12,500 petition signatures and register with the Chicago elections board by next Monday, Nov. 22, to be on the mayoral ballot
Any Illinois registered voter can file an objection to Emanuel's eligibility with the Chicago elections board up until Nov. 30.
Although attorney Odelson represents both Democrats and Republicans in Illinois politics, he was selected by then-Gov. George W. Bush's presidential election campaign to represent the Republican side in the Florida voter recount during the 2000 presidential election.
Odelson was qualified for this assignment by the role he played in 1990 case Pullen v. Mulligan, 561 N.E.2d 585 (1990), a case that first defined the term "chad" as signifying the paper residue that can result from an incompletely punched voter form.
Election day for Chicago mayor is Feb. 22, 2011.
The term for the newly elected mayor in Chicago starts May 16, 2011.
Incumbent Mayor Richard M. Daley, a Democrat, has been in office since 1989; he is not running for re-election.