{"id":217630,"date":"2026-01-03T02:52:07","date_gmt":"2026-01-03T02:52:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/217630\/"},"modified":"2026-01-03T02:52:07","modified_gmt":"2026-01-03T02:52:07","slug":"melissa-nunez-and-elizabeth-branske-win-cook-county-marriage-license-lottery-become-1st-couple-there-to-tie-the-knot-in-2026","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/217630\/","title":{"rendered":"Melissa Nunez and Elizabeth Branske win Cook County marriage license lottery, become 1st couple there to tie the knot in 2026"},"content":{"rendered":"

CHICAGO (WLS) — A celebration of love got underway on Friday as Cook County married its first couple in 2026.<\/p>\n

After two years together, Melissa Nunez and Elizabeth Branske tied the knot.<\/p>\n

ABC7 Chicago is now streaming 24\/7. Click here to watch<\/a><\/p>\n

The 27-year-old hair stylist and mother of an 11-year-old son and the 25-year-old retail worker became the first couple in Cook County to get married in 2026.<\/p>\n

“2026 is supposed to be, like, a year of love and prosperity, so I’m excited to see what it has in store,” Branske said.<\/p>\n

The couple met through a dating app and got engaged in September. Nunez, who is originally from the city’s Southwest Side, came up with the idea to enter the clerk’s annual marriage license lottery.<\/p>\n

“I came home from work one day, and she was like, ‘I did something,’ and I was like, ‘What did you do?’ And she told us that she entered us in this raffle,” Branske said.<\/p>\n

Nearly 1,000 Chicago-area couples entered this year’s lottery, the highest number of entries ever received in the 35 years since the event started, according to the clerk’s office.<\/p>\n

Nunez and Branske, an Elk Grove Village native, were chosen after the couple initially selected dropped out of the contest.<\/p>\n

“They called us, and they were like, ‘The first people dropped out, and you won,’ and we were like, ‘Oh, ok!'” Branske said.<\/p>\n

SEE ALSO | Chicago-area hospitals welcome first babies of 2026<\/a><\/p>\n

The nuptials not only made the couples’ day, but also history. This is the first time two brides won the marriage license lottery and were married.<\/p>\n

Two men won back in 2022 and exchanged vows.<\/p>\n

“I believe in love. I believe in forever love. And I’m looking at you two, and I’m like, this is going to last forever,” said Cook County Clerk Monica Gordon.<\/p>\n

As a wedding gift from the county, the couple not only received their marriage license for free but were given a one-night stay at a downtown hotel along with other special gifts.<\/p>\n

On Friday morning, the couple’s family and friends said their love story was meant to be.<\/p>\n

“They’ve always been going through something, struggling and never had time for themselves and it’s just like after all the struggle and the negativity. They finally have, like, a happy ending,” said their friend, Jen Guzman.<\/p>\n

After the ceremony, everyone went out for pizza.<\/p>\n

Chicago’s first married couple now lives on the city’s Northwest Side and says they look forward to building a strong foundation and hope to have more children.<\/p>\n

The couple is going to forgo a big honeymoon and celebrate with family and friends before having a larger celebration next year.<\/p>\n

Copyright \u00a9 2026 WLS-TV. All Rights Reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"CHICAGO (WLS) — A celebration of love got underway on Friday as Cook County married its first couple…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":217631,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[120400,45878,120399,120398,146,120397,85,46,120396,120395],"class_list":{"0":"post-217630","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-entertainment","8":"tag-120400","9":"tag-cook-county","10":"tag-cook-county-clerk","11":"tag-cook-county-illinois","12":"tag-entertainment","13":"tag-gay-marriage","14":"tag-il","15":"tag-israel","16":"tag-marriage-certificate","17":"tag-marriage-license"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/217630","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=217630"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/217630\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/217631"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=217630"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=217630"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=217630"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}