THE ILLINOIZE: Thursday Free for All
April 7, 2022
Good morning. Happy “Day Before Adjournment Day Day.” We’ll all be celebrating with lots of coffee.
I’ll be on WLS-AM with the great Ramblin’ Ray Stevens (not THAT Ray Stevens) around 6:35 am to talk about what’s happening in Springfield as we tick down the hours to adjournment. You can listen live here.
And if you missed it, I had a fun visit yesterday here in Springfield with my friend Jim Leach at WMAY. I haven’t seen a podcast posted yet, so I’ll drop that on our social media channels when I see it.
Counting today, there are TWO days left before the General Assembly adjourns. The House is IN at 10am. The Senate is IN at 11. The Governor doesn’t have anything on his public schedule.
There will be a lot of pushing and pulling happening throughout the day today, so we’ll keep subscribers updated on the latest developments first. It’s just $7.99 per month or $75 for a year to become one of our paid subscribers. A longtime statehouse figure told me yesterday it’s a value at twice the price. Which is nice to hear.
I hope you’ll click below and join us.
Drop me a note at patrick@theillinoize.com for any questions or thoughts you may have.
Let’s get to it.
YOUR THURSDAY FREE FOR ALL
(note: we’re not responsible for paywalls and restrictions from other news outlets)
Democrats compete for best tax-relief plan with 2 days left (Associated Press)
Illinois is in the rare position of having a surplus in its bank account, which has meant Democrats who control the Legislature are competing in an election-year contest over who can give the most back to taxpayers.
House Democrats popped a budget proposal Wednesday that offers $1.35 billion essentially in refunds to taxpayers, an 40% enhancement of Gov. J.B. Pritzker’s “Illinois Family Relief Plan.” Not to be outdone, Senate Democrats late last week, leaning on the Capitol catch-phrase this spring, “higher than expected revenue,” put up a plan to put $1.8 billion back in voters’ pockets.
The Democratic governor in February introduced a budget that attempts to relieve the pressure from 7% annual inflation. His $970 million proposal would lift sales tax on groceries for a year, freeze a cost-of-living increase in motor fuel tax and offer a property tax rebate.
The House plan would add more than $383 million in a permanent expansion of the Earned Income Tax Credit, a credit to low- and moderate-income earners which they can apply to lower their tax liablity; and an additional $100 rebate in the coming year for each EITC filer, plus $50 for each child. To ease spending by city hall, $100 million would be added to state revenue-sharing with local governments.
“This plan is responsible. It’s balanced. It targets those who need the help the most during these times of high inflation,” said House Revenue Committee Chairman Michael Zalewski, a Riverside Democrat.
With critical funding finally available for long-delayed capital construction work, transportation proponents oppose Pritzker’s plan to freeze the motor fuel tax at 39.2 cents when it was changed in 2019 to index it to inflation. Zalewski said the House plan would freeze the increase but replace the $135 million in the road-building fund from money set aside to clean up leaking underground fuel-storage tanks.
The House Democrats are also proposing $250 million in new spending for public safety, including $124 million to local police agencies for body cameras, automatic license plate readers, non-lethal equipment such as stun-guns and more, said Deputy Majority Leader Jehan Gordon-Booth of Peoria.
RELATED (end of session omnibus): House Democrats pitch $1.4 billion in tax cuts for those who ‘need help the most’ (WBEZ)
Opinion: Senate Dems seek to improve on Pritzker’s savings plan (Shaw Media)
Leftover COVID dollars set off a Springfield scrum (Crain’s Chicago Business)
Editorial: Money, money everywhere in Springfield (Champaign News-Gazette)
Fiery rhetoric flies on House floor as lawmakers pass bills aimed at reducing crime (State Journal-Register)
Dart, legislators want to enlist automakers in curbing carjackings (Chicago Sun-Times)
GOP asks for a performance audit for state’s child protection agency (Capitol News Illinois)
DCFS releases details of 8-year-old’s death as hearing on 30-year-old consent decree looms (Capitol News Illinois)
Springfield rally to call attention to 'souls lost in DCFS' (Daily Herald)
Illinois lawmakers expected to consider nursing home staffing and care tied to new funding formula (Chicago Tribune)
GOP sponsored bill guaranteeing patient visitation during a pandemic passes with bipartisan support (Chicago Tribune)
Hundreds gather for march to support the Second Amendment at Illinois State Capitol (State Journal-Register)
Primary problems: Darren Bailey, Richard Irvin spar over GOP voting records (Bloomington Pantagraph)
Even as state lawmakers gather in the Capitol for the final week of an abbreviated spring legislative session, primary election season continues at full steam with two Republican candidates for governor trading barbs over their primary voting records.
This time, it was the campaign of Aurora Mayor Richard Irvin, a favorite of the state's Republican political establishment, attacking state Sen. Darren Bailey, R-Xenia, a favorite of the conservative grassroots, for voting in the 2008 Democratic primary election.
The mailer from Irvin's campaign leads with the big headline "Bailey breaks with Trump" and features a picture of him next to pictures of former President Barack Obama and President Joe Biden.
It goes onto claim — falsely, the Bailey campaign insists — that Bailey "voted Obama into office in 2008" and then quotes him as saying that "I might have voted for Biden" that year.
It then goes on to read "Reject Obama-Biden Republican Darren Bailey."
It's quite a piece of political literature.
Bailey, for what it's worth, said that he pulled a Democratic ballot that year in an effort to thwart the potential nomination of Hillary Clinton. It was part of an effort spearheaded by conservative radio host Rush Limbaugh known as "Operation Chaos."
Glad we’re talking about the important issues here, fellas.
RELATED: Now it's Pritzker whose Chinese investments draw attention (Crain’s Chicago Business)
'Ugly politics': Congressional candidate alleges retribution by suburban rival (Daily Herald)
Villegas takes fundraising lead over Ramirez in 3rd District race (Crain’s Chicago Business)
The bidders for Rush's seat start to talk up their warchests (Crain’s Chicago Business)
Michael Madigan’s former chief of staff was interviewed by FBI as far back as 2019, lawyer reveals in unsealed filing (Chicago Tribune)
Michael Madigan was still the most powerful politician in the state when two FBI agents went to Springfield in 2019 and asked his former chief of staff to sit down for coffee, according to a court filing unsealed Wednesday.
Two years later, a memo that the former Madigan staffer, Tim Mapes, wrote to himself about the unusual meeting was shown to him during questioning before a federal grand jury, where Mapes had been granted immunity in exchange for his sworn testimony about his former boss, the filing stated.
“This memo was the only document they showed (Mapes) to refresh his admittedly ‘foggy’ memory of events, and it did the trick,” Mapes’ lawyers wrote in a motion to dismiss made public in U.S. District Court. “Mr. Mapes remembered the meeting after being shown the document.”
SOME TOP LINKS FROM THE WEEK SO FAR
Democrat Budget Proposal Spends $2.6 Billion More than Revenue Estimate
GOP Candidate McCullagh Drops Out After "Grooming" Allegation
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the best thing for the dems could do for the citizens of Illinois is take that surplus and apply it to the debt. That is the only responsible action to take to the taxpayers of Illinois