Independent for Mayor
Bob is on the April 6, 2027 ballot — not the February primary.
Illinois has scheduled a consolidated primary for February 23, 2027, to be held only if the parties need one. Either way, Independents do not run in party primaries. If you look at a February ballot and do not see Bob's name, it does not mean he dropped out. He goes straight to the April 6, 2027 election.
New to why there is an election in 2027 at all? The special election, explained from the start →
Nothing you do in February changes your April vote
Illinois has no party registration. You are not registered as a Democrat or a Republican, because Illinois does not record that.
In February you may pull a Democratic ballot, a Republican ballot, or no ballot at all. None of those choices affects your ability to vote for Bob Blosser on April 6, 2027. There is no box you can tick in February that locks you out in April.
What you get out of it
Work with anyone. Owe the job to Rockford voters.
That is the practical difference, and it is the whole of it. Bob won't take office owing a party organization a vote, an appointment or a favor — so the test for every decision at City Hall can be the simple one: does it work for Rockford?
Streets aren't Republican or Democratic. Neither are water bills, permits, policing or neighborhood investment. Bob will work with anyone who can help Rockford, and disagree with anyone when Rockford's interests require it. Independent doesn't mean standing alone.
Rockford has done this before. Morrissey won three terms here as an Independent, from 2005 to 2017. This is not an experiment the city has never run.
The part nobody has told you
Why this seat, and why now
This is a special election. The winner serves two years, not four.
Mayor McNamara announced on July 27, 2026 that he would leave to run the Illinois Municipal League, and his resignation took effect August 31. The City Council chose Alderwoman Janessa Neal to serve as acting mayor from September 1, 2026 until the new mayor is sworn in. April 6, 2027 — the consolidated election, which most people are calling the special election — fills the balance of McNamara's unexpired term: sworn in May 3, 2027, and back in front of Rockford voters on May 7, 2029. That single fact changes what this race is asking of you.
You are not handing a first-time candidate four years. You are handing him twenty-four months and a published report on Day 91. On May 7, 2029 you get to decide again, with a record in front of you instead of a campaign leaflet. Bob will be back in front of Rockford voters in 2029 with a record, not another campaign plan. That is the real answer to the experience question.
It is also most of the answer to “why now.” The seat came open unexpectedly. If a primary is held on February 23, 2027, the parties will use it to pick their nominees; an Independent goes straight to the April ballot and doesn't have to beat a party machine first. And two years is short enough that the record, not the promises, decides whether Bob gets to keep the job.
One more thing worth saying out loud: a special election is a low-turnout, low-information election. That is the environment where an organized volunteer list and a mail-ballot program count for more than a media budget. This campaign is built for exactly that, which is why the voting page is the longest page on the site.
What ballot access costs an Independent
Independent candidates have to build their own path to the ballot, and Bob is doing it one Rockford voter at a time.
An established party's candidates appear on a primary ballot as a function of the party existing. An Independent collects signatures from registered Rockford voters — in person, in ink, inside a fixed window, on sheets that meet a long list of technical requirements — and then survives any objection filed against them.
| Candidate | Minimum | Maximum |
|---|---|---|
| Republican | 25 | 40 |
| Democrat | 68 | 109 |
| Independent — Bob | 864 | 1,383 |
Twenty-five signatures, or eight hundred and sixty-four. Same office, same city, same ballot. The gap is not an accident of drafting: an independent's petition is set as a share of the turnout at the last city election — a floor of 5% and a ceiling of 8% — while a party's candidate files against a share of that party's own last primary vote. Two parties wrote the rules for getting on a ballot and did not write them with a third option in mind. The numbers and the statutes behind them.
Note the ceiling. More is not better — there is a number above which the papers are defective, so this is a job of collecting carefully, not collecting endlessly. It is also part of why the field in this race is crowded: for a party candidate the entry fee is an afternoon's work, and a wide-open seat with a low bar pulls in everyone who wants a look at it.
What Bob gets in return for the higher bar is a straight run at April with no primary to win first, and a mandate that comes from Rockford voters rather than a party organisation. What it costs is 864 conversations at minimum, which is why the petition is the thing this campaign asks for before it asks for anything else.
Most voters have no idea that process exists. It is the clearest statement of what this campaign is. No organization handed Bob a place on the ballot. His neighbors are helping him earn it. Add your name next to his.