By Dave Dahl

TAYLORVILLE – Admitting she voted for herself, State Rep. Avery Bourne (R-Morrisonville) strolled into the Christian County courthouse in Taylorville Tuesday morning and participated in early voting.

Bourne, running mate of Aurora mayor Richard Irvin, said the odd timing of the Illinois primary – next Tuesday, June 28 – make early voting important, should it get lost in anybody’s summer plans.

And she says on June 29, Republicans will make like the Beatles and “come together” regardless of who wins.

“We have to. We have to,” Bourne told reporters outside the courthouse after she voted. “Our team has said from the beginning that we were one of the only campaigns to sign the unity pledge put out by the Illinois Republican Party saying we have to come together. We have to beat the Democrats. That’s ultimately how we fix this state: to elect more Republicans and more common-sense conservatives to get it done. So we have to.”

The office of lieutenant governor is one somebody once quit of boredom. Bourne says she wants to break the stereotype of the inconsequential second-in-command.

“I want to be a partner in policy,” she said. “I’ve worked in the legislature. I want to use my relationships in the legislature to help pass policy.

“Also, we’ve got a lot of issues to tackle,” she continued. “We just saw another failure of (Gov.) JB Pritzker’s (Department of Employment Security) on unemployment fraud being $1 billion. We can run down the list. (Departments of Children and Family Services, Employment Security, Veterans Affairs) All of these agencies have had major failures, and I want to be part of fixing that.”

Irvin is one of six candidates running for governor in the Republican primary.

Dave Dahl can be reached at [email protected].