Candidates for Cook County State's Attorney lay out priorities, vision ahead of Election Day

CHICAGO (WLS) -- One of the most critical local races voters will decide in November is for Cook County State's Attorney. Incumbent Kim Foxx is not seeing reelection.

Republican candidate Bob Fioretti and Democratic candidate Eileen O'Neill Burke both said they will prioritize getting illegal guns off the streets, knowing it will require cooperation with other law enforcement.

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"I'm going to work with the superintendent. I will work with the federal government to make sure we get guns off the streets," Fioretti said.

"I've already talked to every single collar county State's Attorney, and we are going to form a regional gun Crimes Task Force where we are all going in the same direction," said O'Neill Burke.

Both also envision a tough love approach to juveniles committing crimes like carjackings and smash-and-grab burglaries.

"We are also going to be asking for detention each and every time a violent crime is committed with a weapon," O'Neill Burke said.

"I think people are going to be knowing that they are prosecutors not public defenders," said Fioretti.

With cash bail eliminated under the Safe-T Act, there are new challenges to protecting the public.

"It doesn't matter if somebody is a serial killer. It doesn't matter if they're a child sex predator. If the state's attorney does not file that petition to detain, judges have no discretion to detain, and the offender must be released," O'Neill Burke said.

"I think judges need more discretion. I think when you assault a police officer, assault an elderly citizen, those should be detentional crimes," Fioretti said.

In heavily Democratic Cook County, Fioretti knows he is facing an uphill battle.

"I think times are changing, people are fed up with crime, they're fed up with corruption, they see it happening. They're sick and tired," he said.

"I'm not being presumptuous; this is not a done deal. I am running like I'm losing," said O'Neill Burke.

The election is now less than five weeks way. Burke says she will not be out campaigning, but instead preparing to assume the office if she wins. Fioretti as the underdog will be on the campaign trail every day until the election.

There is one additional candidate on the ballot, Andrew Kopinski, who is representing the Libertarian Party.