THE ILLINOIZE: We're back, baby!...Rush to retire...Dems introduce judicial subcircuits in new counties...Zalewski predicts "maintenance" budget...Sandy Hamilton and the puzzler in Sangamon County...
THE ILLINOIZE: We're back, baby!...Rush to retire...Dems introduce judicial subcircuits in new counties...Zalewski predicts "maintenance" budget...Sandy Hamilton and the puzzler in Sangamon County...
January 4, 2021
Good morning and welcome to 2022. We’re back, baby. I’d say better than ever, but, let’s be frank: there’s a six week old living in my house now and he’s anti-sleep. I’ve been awake 21 hours, I’m covered in spit-up, and I just tried to drink yesterday’s coffee. Glamorous.
Thanks so much to all of our guest hosts who filled in and took some things off my plate between Thanksgiving and Christmas. I’ve had a few comments that I just want to quickly address: a few of our guest hosts led people to cancel their subscriptions.
I’m annoyed by that. The entire point of this newsletter is to show that there is more to our politics and policy than partisan talking points. In the future, I’m not asking you to agree with my opinion pieces or of those that contribute on our website or newsletter. I’m asking you to go into things with an open mind. Democrats don’t have the exclusivity on good ideas and Republicans don’t always know how to do it better.
But, more than anything, you’d be shocked to know how much everyone actually agrees on.
Let’s make open minds, free dialogue, and listening to those we disagree with be our New Year’s resolution. I’m going to try my best, even if it’s Darren Bailey.
And to celebrate the new year, we’re knocking $22 off the price of one of our paid subscriptions. Paid subscribers get two specific newsletters each week along with breaking news updates and previews of our long form content, like our interview below with Reps. Mike Zalewski and Mark Batinick.
With the discount, it’s just $53 for a year. You can also try it for a month at $7.99. We hope you’ll join us and help us to continue to build this community aimed at making state government and politics more accessible to the public.
As always, send me your tips, ideas, complaints, questions, or to heap praise at patrick@theillinoize.com.
Let’s get to it.
CONGRESSMAN BOBY RUSH TO RETIRE
First things first, props to NBC 5’s Mary Ann Ahern who had the story first last night.
After 15 terms in Congress, beating back cancer and a primary challenge from a guy named Obama, Congressman Bobby Rush (D-Chicago) will announce this morning he won’t seek re-election later this year.
Rush confirmed his plans to Lynn Sweet of the Sun-Times:
Rush, first elected to Congress in 1992, said in an interview he intends to stay active in his ministry and find ways to use his remarkable life story — a trajectory from a 1960s radical to House member — to inspire younger generations.
Rush, 75, has won each primary and general election by overwhelming margins in the district, anchored on Chicago’s South Side and running through the city’s southern suburbs.
Rush’s significant activism came as the co-founder of the Illinois chapter of the Black Panther Party — a movement that saw the murder of two of its key leaders, Fred Hampton and Mark Clark, by law enforcement.
Rush told me he finalized his decision not to seek another term in the last several weeks, and it came after a conversation with a grandson, Jonathan, 19, who said he wanted to hear more about his grandfather.
“I don’t want my grandchildren . . . to know me from a television news clip or something they read in a newspaper,” Rush said. “I want them to know me on an intimate level, know something about me, and I want to know something about them. I don’t want to be a historical figure to my grandchildren.”
The new 1st District meanders farther from the southside than ever. It includes McCormick Place, cutting a narrow swath through the southside including Hyde Park, Englewood, Auburn Gresham, Morgan Park, and into the south suburbs. The district includes Lockport, Mokena, New Lenox, and portions of Joliet, and slices through a large amount of farmland in southern Will County to pick up part of the Kankakee and Bourbonnais area.
There will likely be a long list of potential candidates to jump into the race now that Rush is stepping aside. Two of the top potential legislative candidates are Sen. Robert Peters (D-Chicago) and Rep. Marcus Evans (D-Chicago).
Aaron Gettinger of the Hyde Park Herald confirmed last night that Alderwoman Jeannette Taylor would not be a candidate. (Complete with a Miss Piggy GIF)
Rush hated the new district, including this scathing line in his statement after the maps came out: "The best thing about this map is that my southern boundaries are not in Iowa.”
GOP: DEMS CIRCUIT COURT PLAN “PARTISAN POWER GRAB”
Democrats say newly released district maps for the election of judges around the state, called subcircuits, will offer “greater opportunities for diversity on the bench.” Republicans, meanwhile, criticized the maps as a way “to gerrymander the courts to uphold the Governor’s agenda.”
House and Senate Democrats late Monday released new subcircuit maps for Cook County, Lake County, and the circuit that includes Winnebago and Boone counties. These counties have already been broken into subcircuits prior to the new map.
In most other judicial circuits, some include a single county (DuPage), while others cover multiple counties (11 in the 2nd Circuit), judges are elected either circuit wide or by county.
But Democrats also released new subcircuit maps for DuPage County, Kane County, the 3rd Circuit, consisting Madison and Bond Counties, and the 7th Circuit, which includes Sangamon, Morgan, Scott, Greene, Jersey, and Macoupin Counties.
The 7th Circuit was split into three subcircuits, including one that generally includes the city of Springfield, another that includes the rest of Sangamon County, and a third that covers the other five counties in the circuit.
Rep. Tim Butler (R-Springfield), the top Republican on the House Redistricting Committee, called the new plans a “partisan power grab” by Democrats to elect more Democratic judges.
“It’s tremendously politicizing the judicial process and an overt power grab to satisfy the Governor’s progressive dreams,” Butler said.
Democrats defended the maps in their announcement.
“These new subcircuits will help improve the diversity of opinion and background of judges, while giving everyone a voice in electing a bench of judges they feel best represent their communities,” their statement read.
The release notes current judges won’t be impacted, meaning judges will be added to each of the circuits. The state pays each circuit judge $212,681 per year.
Democrats also say they’ll introduce new subcircuit maps for Will and McHenry Counties.
More here, including where this whole idea came from.
ZALEWSKI AND BATINICK TALK BUDGET
Some years, passing a state budget is one of the most controversial things in Springfield. 2022 may not be that way, if you believe a top Republican and a top Democrat in the Illinois House.
With a shorter than usual legislative session expected this spring with the impacts of the ongoing pandemic, Rep. Mike Zalewski (D-Riverside), the chair of the House Revenue and Finance Committee, says he doesn’t expect the legislature to move a budget that includes wild new spending programs.
“That doesn’t necessarily mean we won’t have our disagreements with the Senate and it doesn’t necessarily mean we won’t have disagreements with the Governor, and it doesn’t necessarily mean we won’t have disagreement with [Republicans],” Zalewski said. “But I don’t see it being a monumentally difficult budget year.”
Rep. Mark Batinick (R-Plainfield), the second ranking Republican in the House, says he thinks if Democrats stick to a budget that doesn’t try too much, it may not be a difficult year.
“I think a maintenance budget this year will be really easy,” Batinick said. “We need to be a little bit more diligent on what we’re doing with [extra revenue].”
Batinick pointed to existing ideas to use revenue to fund the state’s pension deficit as one way to use extra revenue.
Many Republicans criticized Democrats for attempting to pass expensive new programs and pay for them with one-time federal revenue last year. Zalewski says he wants fellow Democrats to slow down on new programs this year.
“My sense is, the temptation to add programming is probably going to be renewed among our caucus,” Zalewski said. “We have a relatively [inexperienced] caucus, and there’s always an incentive for them to want to add programming and do something that would cost the state treasury. The challenge is going to be convincing everyone that, in a year like this, there’s not going to be a lot of new revenues so you’re going to pretty much have to keep a maintenance budget into 2023.”
Read more about our conversation here.
WHAT WILL THE SANGAMON GOP DO NOW?
Now that Sangamon County Republicans have chosen local realtor Sandy Hamilton to replace former Rep. Mike Murphy in the House, it has kind of left me scratching my head about the vision party leaders have for 2022.
As we told you before the break, legislative Republicans wanted the local party to choose Kelly Thompson, a former Soil & Water Conservation District Association Executive who is now with a Chamber-affiliated energy group, to replace Murphy and take on appointed Sen. Doris Turner (D-Springfield) this fall.
Murphy’s (and now, Hamilton’s) 99th District basically disappears in the new map, and Murphy would not have sought re-election against Rep. Avery Bourne (R-Morrisonville), who picks up a large chunk of Sangamon County in the new map.
Hamilton, though, lives in what will be the new 95th District, which is also where Rep. Tim Butler (R-Springfield) lives. Butler hasn’t announced his plans yet, but he is widely expected to seek re-election to the House.
Does Hamilton run in the 96th against Rep. Sue Scherer (D-Decatur), or is there something else in the works?
Hamilton didn’t return my message last week about her plans.
Mum’s the word in general, but we’ll keep working on it.
BEFORE WE GO
Back tomorrow for subscribers.