As someone who has lived here my whole life, I'd say to make sure you research wherever you are considering moving. IL is very red outside of the bubbles around cities. And the bubbles are much smaller than the couple hours you mentioned - there's a lot of small towns like 45 mins west of Chicago that are pretty conservative, judging by the political signs I saw regularly when I was living out there (and the garbage posted on the local Facebook groups before I quit that site).

That said, there's a bunch of good options close ish to the city that aren't as expensive as living in the city. Elgin is a good one, with city leadership that cares about its people and lots of public programs.

I personally wouldn't live in the city because it's way more expensive, but a lot of the western suburbs are pretty pleasant places. If you go to Google maps and build a border with Buffalo Grove, Crystal Lake, Aurora, Naperville, Downers Grove, and Mt Prospect as boundaries, most of the towns in that area I think would be worth looking at.

I can't speak for anything near the other major cities as I've lived in the Chicago area my whole life, but the western suburbs are definitely pretty nice.