Pritzker could soon become the state’s first three-term governor since Jim Thompson, but he has his eyes on an even bigger office: the presidency. He’s already shown he’s game to take on President Trump. He made a public promise just days after Trump was reelected: “You come for my people, you come through me.” And he’s made good on those words, pushing back against the president’s deportation raids, including by signing into law a bill preventing civil immigration arrests at courthouses. He’s fought Trump’s agenda in other ways, too. Last summer, he signed a bill making the abortion pill more easily available here and increasing access to abortion on college campuses, burnishing his credentials as an ardent defender of abortion rights. Pritzker has also wielded his power within Chicago politics: His vocal opposition was pivotal in defeating the mayor’s proposed corporate head tax. One testament to Pritzker’s influence is that he rarely vetoes bills, since the supermajority Democratic legislature — which he helped build with his campaign donations — is firmly in line with his policies. He isn’t afraid to say no to people with friends in high places, either: When Pritzker visited the Vatican, Pope Leo XIV asked him not to sign a bill that would legalize medical aid in dying. Pritzker did it anyway.

The billionaire shipping supplies tycoon and his wife, Liz, were the fourth-largest donors in the country during the 2024 election cycle, at $143 million — and they got their money’s worth. Not only did Republicans win a trifecta in Washington, but the GOP continued its march rightward, mirroring Uihlein’s staunchly conservative politics. The family’s foundation has also supported the late Charlie Kirk’s political organization, Turning Point USA, which has helped push young voters to the right, a decisive factor in 2024. Just how far right is Uihlein? He donated heavily to groups that cast doubt on the 2020 election, including $1 million the day after the January 6 U.S. Capitol attack to a nonprofit that employs a prominent election-denying lawyer who helped challenge the result in Georgia. After the overturning of Roe v. Wade, he and Liz gave big to state initiatives around the country to ban abortion, most of which failed. The reclusive Lake Forest residents contributed $50 million to right-wing Darren Bailey’s 2022 Illinois gubernatorial run, which stalled in the general election. This time, they’ve switched their support to the more moderate — and thus more electable — Ted Dabrowski. “Uihlein is the money behind the GOP in Illinois, and the GOP in Illinois isn’t doing well with his money,” says a political consultant.

Last year, Goolsbee was one of 12 voting members of the Federal Open Market Committee, which determines U.S. monetary policy. Though he rotates off this year (he’ll be back in 2027), he will still be a key figure in setting interest rates. He’s a frequent commentator on economic issues, seen often on PBS and CNBC, and his words have the power to move markets. (Crypto stocks tanked after he said in November he was “nervous” about inflation.) As a former chair of the Council of Economic Advisers under President Barack Obama, Goolsbee might even be in line to become chair of the Federal Reserve — under a different president. Cautious about inflation, he voted against cutting rates in December, defying Trump’s wishes. As Trump has tried to stack the Fed with loyalists, Goolsbee has been a strong voice for central bank autonomy. “The independence of the Fed couldn’t be more important for the long-run inflation rate in this country,” he told NPR in January. He has also stood up for frequent Trump target Jerome Powell, calling him a “first-ballot Hall of Fame Fed chair.” The vocal defense of norms by Goolsbee and other presidents of the regional banks has helped maintain the wall between the White House and the Fed — for now.

At 78, Preckwinkle is not ready to retire, instead gunning for her fifth term as county chief. “If I didn’t run for reelection, I’d just find a different job, and I doubt that I could find one that’s as interesting and challenging and as important as this one,” she said last year. Even in the autumn of her political career, she remains a kingmaker: 21 of the 23 candidates she endorsed as chair of the Cook County Democratic Party won in the 2024 primaries, with the notable exception of Clayton Harris III for state’s attorney. Another sign of her influence? Last year, the county board unanimously passed Preckwinkle’s $10 billion budget (imagine that, Mayor Johnson!), without adding any fees or taxes. Even the board’s lone Republican praised Preckwinkle’s fiscal discipline.

Davis Gates made Brandon Johnson mayor and remains one of his closest allies. Last year, she added to her power portfolio by winning election as president of the Illinois Federation of Teachers, whose political action committee has a $2 million fund that could be tapped for Johnson’s reelection efforts. Her local union has had mixed results of late: It dished out $2.8 million to support 10 candidates in the 2024 school board elections, but only four won. And as Johnson’s clout has declined, so has Davis Gates’s. She went all in supporting his proposed corporate head tax, only to see it get shot down. If Johnson loses reelection next year, Davis Gates’s influence will slide more, but challengers, be warned: She’s still powerful enough — and enough of a social media troll — to be a thorn in the side of any mayor whose agenda she opposes.

The mayor all the way down at No. 6? “He doesn’t even belong in the top 10,” gripes an alderperson who’s not a fan. That’s a bit harsh, but the reality is that Johnson enters his term’s final year as the weakest mayor in recent memory, thanks to an emboldened City Council. He had political capital and momentum early on, but his failure to persuade voters to pass his “mansion tax” on real estate transactions of more than $1 million stymied his agenda. More recently, the City Council voted 50–0 against his proposal to raise property taxes, then went over his head to pass a budget that did not include the corporate head tax he wanted. There have been successes, such as eliminating the subminimum wage for tipped restaurant workers. And despite concerns over Johnson being soft on crime, homicides are way down. Still, with his approval rating hovering somewhere between ketchup on hot dogs and the Packers, he has little chance to win reelection.

Loathe him or loathe him, the 27-year-old shock artist and Berwyn resident has an unnervingly large following. An antisemite who has praised Hitler (“really fucking cool”) and a misogynist who says women shouldn’t have the right to vote, Fuentes is on the fringe of the fringe — but his influence has grown massively in the past year. The Lyons Township High School graduate loosely leads an army of far-right fans known as Groypers who aim to take over the Republican Party. However far-fetched that sounds, it became likelier after an October interview with Tucker Carlson in which Fuentes railed against “organized Jewry in America” and caused a firestorm that split the MAGA coalition. Yet despite denunciations of Fuentes from mainstream Republicans, conservative cultural critic Rod Dreher says he’s been told that 30 to 40 percent of young Republican staffers in D.C. are Groypers. (Dreher even warned Veep JD Vance about Fuentes’s growing clout.) With millions of followers tuning in to racist screeds that would make Father Coughlin blush, we ignore Fuentes’s power at our own peril.

Once dubbed the “Rahm whisperer” by this magazine for his influence with the former mayor, Sacks had seemed to lose some of his sway in recent years, particularly after the election of Brandon Johnson. But if you thought he had lost a step as a power player, well, reports of his demise have been greatly exaggerated. Sacks funded ads criticizing Johnson’s proposed corporate head tax during the 2025 budget battle, which so irritated Johnson that he challenged Sacks to a debate. Sacks didn’t take the bait, but he got the last word: His side overrode the mayor’s budget. Heading an alternative-investment firm with $87 billion in assets under management, Sacks was named executive of the year by Crain’s Chicago Business, which declared him “the most connected person in Chicago.” An ally of Pritzker, Sacks helped raise $97 million for the 2024 Democratic National Convention, ensuring its profitability. Sacks’s backing is considered critical in next year’s mayoral election. “He’s the name donor in Chicago,” says a political consultant.

The Bears and White Sox have struggled to get new stadiums built. Not the Fire. Mansueto, who made his money founding the investment research firm Morningstar, easily won approval from the City Council for a 22,000-seat venue in the South Loop. The key? He didn’t ask for public money. (It helps when you’re worth $5.1 billion.) The $650 million project will be privately funded, a shrewd move not just because it guaranteed political support but because it gives Mansueto more control. His agreement with Related Midwest, the firm behind the 78, gives the team 10 acres of land anchoring the riverfront development, which is slated to open in 2028. Next up: Trying to turn the Fire, who made the playoffs last season for the first time in eight years, into genuine contenders. Playing in a soccer-specific stadium rather than the cavernous Soldier Field certainly won’t hurt.

Overseeing an archdiocese of nearly 2 million Catholics, Cupich was already a force around town. But now with a Chicagoan as pope, Cupich’s influence in the church is growing. Last year, Pope Leo XIV named him to the Pontifical Commission for Vatican City State, the body responsible for governing the city-state; he is the only member not based in Rome. Cupich, who became a cardinal in 2016, is part of the progressive wing of the church, and he’s using his proverbial pulpit to promote those values in the United States. During last fall’s local immigration raids, Cupich took a stance, insisting that even undocumented immigrants be treated with “dignity.” He has other prominent friends, too: Leo appointed a Cupich acolyte, Joliet bishop Ronald Hicks, as archbishop of New York. Don’t be surprised if Cupich’s next assignment is in Rome.

Though he’s a lame duck, headed to retirement after this year, Durbin remains a power in the Senate, serving as minority whip, the second-highest post in the Democratic caucus — he’s the longest-serving Senate party whip in history — and ranking member of the Judiciary Committee. There, to slow the Republicans’ steamroll, he has helped preserve the “blue slip” tradition that allows senators to block nominees for district judges, U.S. attorneys, and U.S. marshals in their home states. On his way out of office, he has been willing to take some hits for the team: He was one of eight Democratic senators to vote to end last fall’s government shutdown, an unpopular move among the party base but one that the Senate Democratic leader, Chuck Schumer, wanted.

The richest person in Illinois, the Walmart heir — grandson of Sam — is worth nearly $50 billion, ranking him 35th worldwide on the Bloomberg Billionaires Index. Walton puts his money where his heart is, intertwining his investing with philanthropy to make his dollars count. He has poured $15 billion into Builders Vision, the venture capital company he founded that focuses on clean energy, sustainable agriculture, and healthy oceans. While the Trump administration is all in on fossil fuels, Builders Vision has doubled down on protecting the planet. For him, it isn’t just about doing good — it’s smart business. “The opportunities are out there,” he told the Financial Times. “But people first need to realize that the environment is industry, it’s infrastructure, it’s financial products, it’s not simply trees.” He’s spreading the gospel, organizing sessions with fellow heirs and other private investors to advocate for a similar approach.

O’Neill Burke, who as a candidate vowed to prioritize both law and order and restorative justice, made a mark in her first year as the county’s top prosecutor. Among other reforms, she instituted a felony review bypass program, which allows police to file gun charges without prosecutorial oversight, and ended predecessor Kim Foxx’s policy that the value of stolen goods must reach $1,000 to warrant a felony retail theft charge. She also formed the special victims bureau to focus on domestic violence, sexual assault, crimes against children, and hate crimes. Her rollback of Foxx’s progressive policies has angered some criminal justice activists, who point to higher rates of incarceration, but many have credited O’Neill Burke’s tougher policies with helping reduce violent crime.

As head of the 500,000-member CFL, Reiter is one of the most powerful labor leaders in the country. Locally, he was heavily involved in the drafting of legislation to deal with the public transit fiscal cliff, ultimately backing a successful bill that put the CTA, Metra, and Pace under a new agency. He is now testing his influence by supporting Pat Hynes’s challenge to Cook County Assessor Fritz Kaegi, whom he blames for skyrocketing property-value assessments. As a result, member unions have donated as much as $100,000 to Hynes’s campaign. Except for backing Kamala Harris (who, of course, did win Illinois), the CFL was almost undefeated in its 2024 endorsements. There have been some swings and misses, though: Reiter urged the City Council to consider a property tax increase during the 2025 budget debate. No dice.

More vocally anti-Trump than Durbin, Duckworth will become Illinois’s senior senator when her seatmate retires. As a disabled veteran, she’s been a strong voice on military matters, sponsoring a bill to expand IVF coverage for service members. She has used her military experience to effectively criticize the Trump administration: She blasted Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth for saying women can’t meet the physical fitness requirements for combat, and at a hearing of the Senate Armed Services Committee, she criticized administration officials for deploying the National Guard to Chicago “under false pretenses.” Noting that the senator lost her legs after her Black Hawk helicopter was shot down in Iraq, a Duckworth admirer says: “She never lets the chicken hawks forget she’s a war hero.” As the administration attempts to politicize the military, expect Duckworth to become an even more outspoken voice in the years to come.

Yes, Welch will never be as powerful as his predecessor, Michael Madigan. The state legislature made sure of that by limiting speakers to 10-year terms. But he’s had some big successes, including passing a $1.5 billion transit bill. He stood up to the Chicago Bears’ demand for $855 million in infrastructure upgrades to build a new stadium in Arlington Heights, calling it “insensitive” at a time when the cost of living is rising. (Whether he and other Illinois politicians hold firm, with Indiana dangling incentives, remains to be seen.) Despite national party pressure, he made it clear he didn’t support mid-decade redistricting to add a Democratic congressional seat in Illinois, with members of the Black Caucus worrying it would endanger Black representatives. Another sign of Welch’s clout: When he and his Senate counterpart, Don Harmon, both declared for the 7th Congressional District seat on the Democratic State Central Committee, Harmon backed down.

As head of Harvard’s top governing board, Pritzker was the one who called Claudine Gay to persuade her to resign as the university’s president over accusations of plagiarism and the backlash for her handling of antisemitism on campus. Pritzker, chair of the investment firm she started and a board member of Microsoft, finds herself on the front lines of the White House’s war on the country’s elite academic institutions. With its $57 billion endowment, Harvard can afford to say no to Trump’s “academic reforms,” which come under threat of funding cuts. But Pritzker’s defiance makes her a target of Education Secretary Linda McMahon and hedge fund titan Bill Ackman, a Trump supporter and Harvard alum. Despite reports that even some within Harvard want her out, she has resisted resigning. But even if she leaves, the billionaire’s influence on campus will remain: She gave $100 million to her alma mater’s new economic building. Its name? Pritzker Hall.

During last year’s government shutdown, Kirby stood beside JD Vance at a White House press conference, calling for a bill to reopen federal operations. (Americans don’t mind a little stoppage here and there, but just don’t make them suffer through airport delays.) Kirby has been active on the dealmaking front, partnering with JetBlue to allow loyalty members to redeem points with either carrier. There’s no such alliance with American: That Texas-based rival is vying for more gates at O’Hare, but United has no intention of giving up real estate at its hometown hub. Kirby has vowed to stop American from adding “a single gate” this year at his airline’s expense. We’re here for the drama — and the lower fares wrought by an airline war.

As his 2018 campaign manager, Caprara helped get JB Pritzker elected — and now she’s his most important adviser. “She is the person that I rely upon in nearly every circumstance for good advice, and sometimes for encouragement, and often to deter me from a bad idea,” the governor told the central Illinois newspaper The Pantagraph. Caprara, who has helped determine Pritzker’s strategy for fighting the Trump administration, has been the lead writer of all his State of the State budget addresses and is expected to play an important role in his bid for a third term. She told Politico that she earns the governor’s respect by pushing back against him: “He has time and patience for everybody except yes people. … If you don’t challenge him he will challenge you.” She also has a large soapbox herself: On Bluesky, where she has nearly 100,000 followers, she promotes her boss and denounces the White House. If Pritzker becomes president, don’t be surprised if Caprara joins him in Washington.

The Bears are fresh off their first playoff win since 2011, but Warren has bigger fish to fry (er, cheese to grate). He’s the point man for the Bears’ expected move to a new stadium, this one with a fixed roof so that it can host a Super Bowl, and Warren is fostering a potential interstate bidding war. Even as he’s deep in talks about an Arlington Heights parcel, he revealed the team is considering jumping across the border because Illinois hasn’t committed to infrastructure upgrades. During wild-card weekend, Warren was spotted touring several northwest Indiana sites with the NFL’s commissioner, Roger Goodell. It all might be a ploy, but it’s been an effective one: Governor Pritzker seems to have softened his tone, saying there is “optimism” that the state could reach a deal with the team. If the Bears get what they want, it will have been a feint straight from Ben Johnson’s playbook.

Raoul has become the legal arm of anti-Trump resistance in Illinois. While plenty of politicians simply tweet against the president, Raoul has won real judicial victories. He successfully sued the federal government to block the deployment of National Guard troops and filed the lawsuit that stopped the administration from cutting off Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program benefits to legal immigrants. He also got a judge to block a federal freeze on wind farm permits. He has had other victories too, including a $12 million settlement from an energy company the state accused of “fraudulent, unfair and deceptive business practices.” Raoul declined a Senate run, so he’s going to be AG for a while, which makes him, in the words of one statehouse expert, “the managing director of one of the biggest law firms in the country.”

One of the few basketball players, man or woman, who transcend the sport, Reese has appeared on the cover of Vogue and modeled at the Victoria’s Secret Fashion Show, the first pro athlete to do so. Her endorsements, which earn her far more than her $81,096 basketball salary, include Reebok (which is releasing an Angel Reese shoe), Amazon, PlayStation, and McDonald’s. Headed into her third year with the Sky, she has helped fuel the WNBA’s rise in popularity, not least because of a not-entirely-just-media-fueled rivalry with Caitlin Clark. With more than five million followers on Instagram and 157,000 YouTube subscribers for her podcast, Unapologetically Angel, Reese has plenty of fans and no shortage of haters — the ultimate sign of her outsize influence.

Dowell, chair of the City Council’s finance committee, is a Johnson appointee, but she hasn’t let that keep her from standing up to the mayor. Her committee nixed his proposal for a corporate head tax, which she called “a proven job killer,” voting it down 25–10. She was also an important player in crafting the City Council’s alternative budget, which the mayor was forced to accept. As chair of the council’s most clout-wielding committee, she represents the large number of emboldened alders who are taking power back from the mayor’s office — and ushering in a new era of shared control in Chicago.

Thanks to the Ricketts family, owners of the Cubs, the area around Wrigley Field is unrecognizable compared with what it was a decade ago, not least because of the 2023 addition of the DraftKings Sportsbook, which provides a year-round revenue stream for the team. Now Tom Ricketts is turning his attention to baseball itself. With the current collective bargaining agreement set to expire in December, he is one of the owners who could push for a salary cap. In fairness, you’d want a cap, too, if you had to compete with the free-spending Dodgers (projected payroll north of $400 million), who recently lured Kyle Tucker from the Cubs. Ricketts’s sway goes beyond sports: The scion of a wealthy Republican family — his brother Pete is a U.S. senator from Nebraska — he donated $289,000 to the National Republican Senatorial Committee during the 2024 election.

Could Giannoulias be Chicago’s next mayor? Though he hasn’t announced his candidacy, he’s already seen as a front-runner. (A hint he’ll likely run: Despite facing no real opposition for his current seat, he’s raised more than $6 million for his “reelection” coffers.) But his ambitions may not stop there. “Political insiders are buzzing about the possibility Giannoulias could run for mayor and then, even, president,” Politico reported in January. Whoa, let’s not get ahead of ourselves. Still, Giannoulias has shown he’s willing to play in the big leagues, tangling with the Trump administration: He called Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem “dangerously incompetent and cruel” and cooperated in a lawsuit brought by Illinois and Chicago in January challenging tactics used by federal immigration agents, such as swapping license plates to avoid being identified.

The longtime friend of the Obamas and former senior White House adviser has overseen the creation of the Obama Presidential Center in Jackson Park — which, when it opens in June, will instantly become one of the city’s core draws. It’s a much more ambitious presidential monument than most, with its sprawling campus intended to serve as a hub for civic engagement. Pulling it off has been no easy task. Jarrett has had to leverage her connections to help raise the $850 million for construction costs and used her political instincts to assuage neighbors’ concerns by moving parking underground and adding more green space.

Hobson is a leading light of Chicago’s rich and famous, even though she lives here only part-time. She’s collaborating with her husband, Star Wars creator George Lucas, on this year’s opening of the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art in Los Angeles, a project they once envisioned on the Chicago lakefront before Friends of the Parks had its say. The couple’s $33.5 million Streeterville condo is the city’s most expensive, a feat they managed by combining their unit with the penthouse above it, which they purchased from hedge-fund titan Ken Griffin. Once the chair of Starbucks, Hobson stepped down from that board last year but remains a director at JPMorganChase and has found other ways to use her sway: She owns pieces of the White Sox, the Denver Broncos, and the WNBA and recently started a fund at Ariel to invest in women’s sports.

When business interests in this city gather to discuss civic concerns, they ask, “Where’s Jim Perry?” says a politician familiar with the machinations. Perry, now an adviser at the private equity firm he helped start, has become one of the city’s top political moneymen. He is a key figure in a band of local business leaders who will likely decide together whom to funnel their money toward in the 2026 mayor race . In the Republican primary for governor, he is joining John Canning Jr., chairman emeritus of Madison Dearborn, and several other financial-industry magnates in backing Ted Dabrowski. (Perry gave him $250,000.) Attempting to stem the growing power of the Chicago Teachers Union, he donated $100,000 to Urban Center Action, a pro-charter-school PAC, during the 2024 school board elections, but only three UCA-backed candidates won.

Thanks largely to his fundraising, Krishnamoorthi is the clear front-runner in March’s Democratic primary for U.S. Senate, a seat that would significantly ratchet up his congressional standing. By the end of 2025, he had padded his war chest to $15 million. Using the cash to get on TV long before rival candidates (his “Call Me Raja” ads are ubiquitous) has helped him muscle past Lieutenant Governor Juliana Stratton in the race. Krishnamoorthi, now in his fifth term in the House, until recently served on the House select committee on China and cosponsored the bill forcing ByteDance to sell or divest TikTok, owing to concerns over the company’s ties to the Chinese government.

The 90-year-old Reinsdorf is on the way out (he is gradually shedding his Sox shares) but still controls two major civic assets. No matter that one of those franchises recently lost more games in a single season than any other team in modern MLB history and the other hasn’t won an NBA playoff series in more than a decade. Reinsdorf has so far failed in his efforts to build a Sox stadium at the 78 to replace the colorless Rate Field. His demand for government subsidies fell on deaf ears, despite some flirtation with a move to Nashville. He had better luck on the Bulls front: The City Council approved a $7 billion redevelopment of the area around the United Center.

She has reshaped urban design as the designer of some of Chicago’s most distinctive buildings, including Aqua Tower and the St. Regis Chicago. Her structures’ organic, undulating shapes and connection to the outdoors — such as the Nature Boardwalk at Lincoln Park Zoo — have pushed the field toward a greater embrace of the environment. Gang, a Harvard alum and professor, drew up the plans for the recently completed David Rubenstein Treehouse, the university’s first mass timber building. And when the perpetually delayed O’Hare Global Terminal finally gets built, her Y-shaped design, which significantly incorporates sustainable elements, will redefine the airport.

The video version of Katz’s ultrapopular Pardon My Take podcast, which is a fixture atop Apple charts and has 662,000 subscribers on YouTube, moved exclusively to Netflix this year, along with two other Barstool podcasts. It’s a gamble that could alienate some loyal viewers but will reportedly pay Barstool eight figures. Katz, a massive Bears fan (Pardon My Take secured one of the first interviews with Ben Johnson after his hiring), was key to Barstool’s decision to move here from New York in 2023 and set up a 39,000-square-foot headquarters in a renovated West Loop warehouse.

Under Palfrey’s direction, the foundation — one of the nation’s largest, with an endowment of $9 billion — has been increasing its grants in response to federal funding cuts. “We need to step up,” Palfrey, who was named to Time’s list of the 100 most influential people in philanthropy, told The Guardian. His nonprofit donated to Chicago food banks to help offset the lapse of SNAP benefits and to cash-strapped public media stations. Adhering to its strategy of making “big bets” to have maximum impact, the foundation is leading two recent initiatives of $500 million or more: one to ensure AI is used for good, and the other to support local journalism.

Wirtz scored a major win last year when the City Council approved an ambitious plan for his family and the Reinsdorfs, who co-own the United Center, to develop 55 acres surrounding the stadium. Dubbed the 1901 Project (a reference to the arena’s 1901 West Madison Street address), the $7 billion development will replace the sea of parking lots with music venues, hotels, housing, and parkland, transforming the area from an event-driven site to a 24/7 destination. It’ll be a boon not only for the stadium owners but for the Near West Side. Led by Wirtz and Michael Reinsdorf, the project is expected to break ground this spring and wrap up around 2040.

Since becoming head of the government-funded, 3,800-employee research facility in Lemont in 2017, Kearns has grown its influence. Currently, Argonne is partnering with South Korea to develop silicon sensors for an electron-ion collider that could unlock secrets of the universe’s fundamental forces. Last year, the lab also announced a major collaboration with chipmaker Nvidia and cloud-computing giant Oracle to build the Department of Energy’s largest AI supercomputer — showing that no matter who’s running Washington, Kearns knows how to secure major deals.

The last of the Irish political bosses, Harmon helped guide the $1.5 billion transportation bill and reorganized local agencies into the Northern Illinois Transit Authority. He also stood alongside Chris Welch in opposing new public funding for Bears or White Sox stadiums. He had enough clout with the Illinois State Board of Elections to get it to cancel his $10 million fine for raising excess campaign cash in 2024. Despite losing out on the Democratic State Central Committee spot to Welch, the Oak Parker will still hold plenty of sway over elections with his control of the Illinois Senate Democratic Fund, which could help his party further pad its already overwhelming Springfield majority.

After expanding the conference to 18 schools, Petitti negotiated a controversial deal for $2.4 billion in private equity investments that will be distributed to every member in exchange for 10 percent of its media rights. The deal has the support of most schools, but Petitti’s push for its passage has stalled after the University of Michigan protested. Another test of Petitti’s power: College Football Playoff expansion. The Big Ten supports eventually growing it from 12 to 24 teams, but the Southeastern Conference has only backed a 16-team format, so the status quo remains. Meanwhile, the last three national champs — Michigan, Ohio State, and Indiana — have hailed from the Big Ten, quieting the SEC supremacist crowd.

No one is closer to Brandon Johnson than Lee, dubbed “the shadow mayor” by the Sun-Times. He’s so indispensable that Johnson ignored the inspector general’s recommendation to fire him for refusing to cooperate with an investigation into whether he threatened to withhold resources from Alderperson Bill Conway’s ward unless Conway voted Johnson’s way on two ordinances. Lee is Johnson’s designated arm-twister at the City Council, although his failure to persuade alders to support the mayor’s head tax proposal is as much a reflection of Johnson’s diminishing power as Lee’s. “He seems less of a player lately,” says a City Hall expert. “He’s told to stay out of the media.” Low profile or not, as long as Johnson is mayor, Lee will be key to getting his agenda — what’s left of it — enacted.

A rare Democrat in the Ricketts family, she is serving as cochair of U.S. Senate candidate Juliana Stratton’s finance committee and cofounded LPAC, which works to elect LGBTQ female and nonbinary candidates. An advocate for women’s sports, she’s a minority owner of the WNBA’s Chicago Sky and led a group of female investors who bought the NWSL’s Chicago Stars. In January, the Stars, who will play this year on Northwestern’s campus and then likely at Ryan Field, announced they would build a dedicated training facility in Bannockburn, a development Ricketts hailed as setting “the standard in women’s professional soccer.”

One of the hottest music video directors in hip-hop and the organizer of the Lyrical Lemonade Summer Smash music festival in Bridgeview, Bennett has worked with the likes of Lil Durk, Eminem, Drake, Big Sean, Cardi B, and the late Juice WRLD, and his vibrant, often surreal videos have amped up the artists’ visibility. The grad of suburban Plano High School is so confident in his talent that when he was 20 (he’s 29 now), he turned down a $30 million offer for his company. He told Complex he has no regrets: “I wouldn’t have known what to do.”

A year ago, the 67-year-old Rogers stepped down as manager of the midcap Ariel Appreciation Fund but still handles the company’s flagship Ariel Fund and three others. Though assets under management have slid of late, from $16.2 billion in 2022 to $14.3 billion, the mutual fund firm he founded is still the largest Black-owned one in the country. A longtime friend of Barack Obama, going back to the president’s Hyde Park days (he was cochair of the 2009 inaugural committee), Rogers sits on the board of the Obama Foundation. “He’s the most powerful Black businessman in town,” says a local political consultant. “When the mayor has issues with the business community, he turns to Rogers.”

Charania’s obsessive coverage of the NBA has earned him a reputation as the league’s best-connected reporter — enough to prompt ESPN to lure him away from The Athletic in 2024. (One of his biggest scoops: the Luka Doncic–Anthony Davis trade.) With the retirement of former rival and ESPN predecessor Adrian Wojnarowski, Charania — a New Trier and Loyola University graduate — is now the nation’s most widely followed basketball insider, earning a salary in the multimillions.

The 2023 appointment of Snelling to head the Chicago Police Department is one decision by Mayor Johnson that even his most ardent critics praise. A Chicago native, Snelling has the respect of both rank-and-file officers and politicians. Whether it’s his doing or not, murders have been down every year since he took over. He has consolidated control within the department, taking direct oversight of the patrol, detective, and counterterrorism bureaus. Another power play, one that rankles civil rights watchers: His criticism of Andrea Kersten, chief of the Civilian Office of Police Accountability, contributed to her eventually being pushed to resign from the watchdog group.

Mendoza, who isn’t seeking reelection to her current role and will almost certainly run for mayor, will leave office having reduced the state’s unpaid bills from $16.7 billion to under $1.4 billion, ensured bills are paid within 30 days of receipt, and earned the state nine credit upgrades in three years. Already in campaign mode, Mendoza has been a frequent critic of Mayor Johnson on X and in the Tribune, saying he “has done nothing to cut costs and rein in profligate spending” and criticizing his squelched plan to take out a high-interest $300 million loan for teacher salaries and pensions. She has the power of the populace: In the 2022 election, she was the top vote getter among statewide candidates in Illinois.

The 23-year-old has built an enormous following among Trump haters, with 1.8 million subscribers to his YouTube channel, where he posts videos with titles such as “Kristi Noem PANICS as ICE FOOTAGE Exposes Her” (650,000 views). Touted as a left-wing answer to the late Charlie Kirk, the DePaul University dropout, part of the influential liberal network MeidasTouch, has appeared on CNN, Piers Morgan Uncensored, and Jubilee Media’s Surrounded, where he debated 20 MAGA college students at once. With political media increasingly dominated by YouTubers and podcasters, Mockler will no doubt play a significant role in shaping perceptions of Democratic presidential hopefuls in 2028.

The private equity billionaire, who also owns the Phoenix Suns and has a minority interest in Nashville’s MLS team, is in line to take over a controlling interest in the Sox from Jerry Reinsdorf as soon as 2029. Ishbia, who is building a $77 million home in Winnetka that will be the most expensive in state history, is already making capital investments in the South Side’s lovable losers, paying down debt and supporting team operations. To help turn the team around, he’s seeking divine intervention: When he met Pope Leo at the Vatican last fall, he asked the noted Sox fan to bless the stadium Ishbia is aiming to build — and requested that the pope throw out the first pitch there.

If this were a list of the most powerful people in Evanston, Ryan would be No. 1. The billionaire insurance magnate’s $480 million gift to his alma mater, Northwestern University, in 2021 was the largest donation in the university’s history. Those funds were earmarked for biomedical, economics, and business research and to build the new football and concert stadium that will bear his name. He also owns an 18 percent stake in the Bears, making him the second-largest partner, after the McCaskey family.

The Chicago-based energy giant that Butler oversees, which owns ComEd and five other utilities, manages the natural gas and electricity supply for more than 10 million customers across multiple states. Like the rest of the industry, Exelon is grappling with increasing demand fueled by the growth of AI data centers. So under Butler, it is spending $38 million over the next four years to upgrade infrastructure, including new substations in northern Illinois. A test of his clout: He has been lobbying state legislatures to allow utilities to generate their own electricity, instead of buying it from independent producers, which he argues would allow Exelon and the like to increase capacity and cut prices.

Long the city’s most prominent and influential artist, Gates has been partnering with splashy names these days. The UChicago’s Smart Museum of Art hosted his first local solo exhibition last fall, and his montage of Black life drawn from photos in Ebony and Jet (his foundation houses the Johnson Publishing archives) was tapped by English fashion designer Grace Wales Bonner for one of her collections and will be displayed at the soon-to-open Obama Presidential Center. Gates has played a significant role in redeveloping the South Side, with his Stony Island Arts Bank, Kenwood Gardens, and Dorchester Art and Housing Collaborative.

His real estate development company is behind some of the highest-profile projects in Chicago. It is working on the 78 in the South Loop, including the Chicago Fire’s new stadium, and is taking the lead on the $9 billion quantum computing campus planned for the old U.S. Steel site on the South Side. The company has also begun construction on the first of two big residential towers on the former Chicago Spire site. All of which puts Bailey shoulder to shoulder with political bigwigs, including JB Pritzker, who joined him in the announcement of the quantum campus.