* With Patty Schuh’s move to the governor’s office, he has big shoes to fill…
The following is a statement by Senate Republican Bill Brady on his selection of a new Press Secretary.
“I am excited to announce that Jason Gerwig will serve as my, and the Senate Republican caucus’ new Press Secretary beginning today,” said Brady (R-Bloomington). “Jason brings over 20 years of communications and government experience to this important position, and he’s been a well-respected, and valued, member of our staff. I look forward to working with him, and all or our staff, as we prepare for another important legislative session.”
Jason Gerwig’s biography:
Illinois Senate Republican Staff, Communications, 1996-2001
Illinois State Treasurer’s Office, Legislative Liaison, 2001-2003
Illinois Republican Party, Communication’s Director, 2003-2005
DuPage County Board, Communication’s Manger, 2005-2010
DuPage County Health Department, External Affairs Manager, 2010-2013
FleishmanHillard, Vice President of Public Affairs, 2013-2015
Illinois Senate Republican Staff, Assistant to the Chief of Staff for Communications, 2016-2017
Illinois Senate Republican Staff, Press Secretary, 2017-present
* Democratic Rep. Sam Yingling was absent today, so that hurt the proponents. Retiring GOP Reps. Bill Mitchell, Chad Hays and Bob Pritchard didn’t vote. House Republican Leader Jim Durkin worked the roll call very hard. Rep. McCombie, who voted Yes when it initially passed, didn’t vote today. Rep. McAuliffe didn’t vote last time and voted “Present” this time. The sponsor can make another run at it, however. The Senate overrode the veto yesterday…
The bill is here. It received 67 votes when it originally passed. The House sponsor, Rep. Marty Moylan, said he planned to file a trailer bill to remove criminal penalties for passing local ordinances to implement the zone. The bill has no immediate effective date, so he would have until June to get that done.
…Adding… The misdemeanor criminal penalty was the focus of much of today’s debate…
Rep. Moylan says he will file a trailer bill to take off misdemeanor language. Then call right-to-work bill again the second week of veto.
* Meanwhile, this gubernatorial veto was also overridden with 80 House votes, down from 91 when it originally passed. It now moves to the Senate, where it received 35 votes (one vote shy of an override, but some Dems were missing) in May…
The Illinois House has voted to override Gov. Bruce Rauner on a measure that would prohibit employers from asking applicants about their salary history.
Elgin Democratic Rep. Anna Moeller’s (MOH’-lurz) legislation is seen as a gender-equity bill. Women are often paid less than men for the same work and are at a disadvantage if forced to report a previous, unfairly low wage.
The legislation would prevent employers from demanding past salary history, screening job applicants based on wage history, or requiring that past salary meet a certain criteria.
* And on a related note, this override motion really had no chance. While Republicans may be super angry at the governor these days, they aren’t ever gonna be up for stuff like this…
House fails to override a veto on a state-sponsored workers’ compensation insurance company, 65-50.
On an 86-29 vote, the House overrode Rauner’s veto of legislation that would require small businesses to hire a licensed roofer to perform roofing or waterproofing work on a residential property that is being used as a business, preventing the business owner from using an employee to conduct the work.
Rauner vetoed the legislation, saying it was another example of the over-regulation of job creators in the state.
The bill’s sponsor, Rep. Daniel Burke, D-Chicago, said it’s a public safety issue.
“You can’t expect to hire your dishwasher to use a torch to fix your roof and expect you’re not going to have problems,” Burke said, pointing to a specific example of a non-licensed employee improperly using a torch on a roof in a Chicago neighborhood. “Our job in this body is to protect the public in any way we see fit.”
* In other veto session news…
Daniel Biss released the following statement as the Senate successfully overrode Bruce Rauner’s veto of the Student Loan Bill of Rights.
“I was proud to introduce the Student Loan Bill of Rights, and I’m grateful for the advocates and legislators who fought to override Bruce Rauner’s veto today.
“After a summer of diverting taxpayer dollars to private schools and siding with predatory lenders rather than vulnerable student borrowers, our billionaire businessman governor has again proven himself incapable of setting aside profit motives to protect students and middle-class families like mine. I urge my House colleagues to override the veto as well and finally provide students the protections they deserve as they pursue higher education.”
The bond-market drop didn’t diminish demand in Illinois’s biggest debt sale in more than a decade.
As the state marketed $4.5 billion of bonds Wednesday, securities due November 2028 are being offered at a preliminary yield of 3.74 percent, according to four people with knowledge of the pricing who requested anonymity because the yields aren’t final. That’s lower than the 3.78 percent yield for the November 2029 portion of last week’s $1.5 billion deal, even though bond prices have slid since then.
Investors said the yields are alluring, with benchmark 11-year tax-exempt debt paying about 2.1 percent.
“The issuer still offers a tremendous amount of yield in a pretty yield-starved environment,” said Gabriel Diederich, fixed income portfolio manager at Wells Fargo Asset Management, which holds $41 billion in municipal bonds, including those issued by Illinois. “Outside of this little supply hump here with this deal, there really hasn’t been much muni issuance before this or likely in the weeks ahead.”
Part of the reason it’s a “yield-starved environment” is that most other states have their fiscal houses in order, unlike Illinois.
* The bonds are designed to pay off past due bills…
Of course, whereever the yields land in final wire on $4.5B deal it's A LOT better than 9% and 12% rates on some bills……and better than the 193bp and 185 spreads on 2016 deals and 273 and 292 spreads before budget passed.
Do Your Job, Inc. is debuting a new digital ad in response to Governor Rauner’s re-election slogan in which he reminds people that instead of governing he chooses to fight.
After spending most of his first term campaigning instead of governing, Governor Rauner announced Monday that we’re in for more of the same. He may have ditched the Carharrt jacket and cheap watch but don’t let his costume change fool you, Illinoisans are in for a wild ride.
People from across the political spectrum don’t trust Governor Rauner. With each day, more and more conservatives are voicing their criticisms.
Illinois House Republican Floor Leader Peter Breen was recently quoted as saying: “I’ve had a front-row seat to a governor that is unable to adequately and competently administer Illinois government.” While conservative state Sen. Dan McConchie is on the record questioning “whether the governor’s word can be trusted.” […]
Do Your Job, Inc. will continue to speak up on behalf of Illinoisans disappointed with Bruce Rauner’s refusal to do his job. The organization is led by IL Sen. Michael E. Hastings of South Suburban Cook County, IL Rep. Lou Lang of Skokie and Illinois AFL-CIO President Michael T. Carrigan.
Local and state behavioral health advocates are sounding the alarm on Illinois’ swelling mental health crisis.
“Wait times to see a psychiatrist in Illinois’ community mental health system can now range from 4 to 6 months,” said Tim Sheehan, Chairperson of the Public Policy Committee of the Community Behavioral Healthcare Association of Illinois and Vice President of Home and Community Services at the Des Plaines-based Lutheran Social Services of Illinois. “The lack of an adequate behavioral health care workforce is causing longer and longer wait times for people struggling with mental illness to receive care, a situation which has reached crisis proportions in the state.”
Sheehan noted that according to the Illinois Department of Healthcare and Family Services, the inadequate behavioral health workforce is responsible for the state’s “insufficient community behavioral health services capacity.”
In fact, Illinois ranks 30th in mental health workforce availability with 844 people per mental health worker compared to the national median of 752, Sheehan points out.
A top Illinois behavioral health advocacy group leader says that the limited access to front-line mental health care in Illinois is “staggering and shameful” while local community agencies’ budgets are spending more on administrative costs due to the state’s new managed care system.
“There is a staggering and shameful lack of access to behavioral health care represented by a shortage of specialists, such as child and adolescent psychiatrists, advanced practice nurses, and physician assistants,” said Community Behavioral Health Association of Illinois CEO Marvin Lindsey. “Meanwhile, the administrative staff costs of providing community behavioral health services have increased dramatically, by as much as two to five times, since Illinois implemented Medicaid Managed Care.”
Sheehan agreed.
“More money is being devoured by administrative costs associated with paperwork demands of Illinois’ expanded Medicaid Managed Care program and less on investing in an adequate, front-line behavioral health workforce to care for patients,” Sheehan said.
Lindsey, Sheehan and other behavioral health advocates are planning a two-prong state legislative offensive to address Illinois’ deepening mental health care crisis.
“We’re planning on pushing a Resolution in the Illinois General Assembly to declare a ‘mental health care emergency in Illinois’ to raise awareness of the critical problem of access to care,” Lindsey said. “And we are going to advance legislation that would comprehensively address the behavioral health workforce crisis, which is undermining mental health care in Illinois.”
Fixing behavioral health workforce is a “priority,” says Sheehan.
“For community mental health agencies across the state, including Lutheran Social Services of Illinois, providing more support, more training, and a deeper bench to the behavioral health workforce is a top advocacy priority,” said Sheehan. “It’s critical.”
The three governors say the troubles in Illinois have created new jobs in Wisconsin, Indiana and Missouri. The ad debuted Tuesday, October 24th.
“Our economy’s on fire…so we owe you,” [Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker] says. “Cheeseheads love you, Madigan.”
Democrats said Walker should focus on his own job and improve Wisconsin’s slow economic growth.
“Gov. Walker cutting an attack ad on jobs in Illinois is a bizarre move for a guy who broke his 2010 promise to create 250,000 jobs in here by 2014 and still hasn’t gotten to that number in 2017,” said Scot Ross, executive director of the liberal group One Wisconsin Now.
Rauner donated $100,000 of his own money to Holcomb’s campaign last year immediately after Indiana’s then-lieutenant governor secured the Republican nomination for the state’s top job.
Indiana Democratic Party Chairman John Zody wasn’t impressed by Holcomb’s appearance in Rauner’s ad.
“Gov. Holcomb is implying his party’s policies aren’t responsible for growing good-paying jobs in Indiana, and he’s right about that,” Zody said. “Fact is, Indiana remains 38th in per capita income, and there is no plan to grow wages at the Statehouse — except to study the pay of state elected officials.”
In the latest example of Governor Greitens caring more about out-of-state politicians and wealthy campaign donors than working Missourians, the Missouri Democratic Party is highlighting that Greitens recently focused his attention on shooting a TV ad for an Illinois politician who gave $100,000 to his campaign last year.
In the TV ad for Illinois Governor Bruce Rauner, Eric Greitens talks directly to the camera, along with other anti-worker politicians like Governor Scott Walker, in an attempt to explain why the Republican Governor of Illinois should not be blamed for the state’s economic problems.
“When Eric Greitens promised he’d be an outsider, who would of guessed he literally meant he’d spend all his time and attention outside of Missouri?” said Missouri Democratic Party Chair Stephen Webber. “But then again, we’re not surprised he found a way to step in front of a camera – especially in an attempt to help another politician and wealthy campaign donor.”
* From the Illinois Policy Institute’s news service…
Illinois’ candidates for governor support making businesses pay higher minimum wages but don’t pay their campaign interns.
J.B. Pritzker, Chris Kennedy, Bruce Rauner, and Daniel Biss have together accumulated more than $100 million in campaign funds with more than a year until the election. All of the Democrat candidates last week expressed support for a higher minimum wage than the $8.25 the state has had since 2010. The federal minimum wage is $7.25 an hour. […]
None of their campaigns offer paying internships, including Rauner’s, and none respond Tuesday to requests for comment.
Trevor Smith with the non-profit “Pay Our Interns” said it’s disingenuous when a politician pushes for a minimum wage hike but leaves his interns to work for free.
“If someone is for the ‘Fight for $15′ but doesn’t pay their interns, we see that as someone that’s not truly invested in helping lower income people,” he said. “If they campaign on raising the minimum wage to $15 an hour, but then don’t pay their interns behind peoples’ backs, I would call it phony.”
Smith said unpaid internships also perpetuate the wage gap between students that are able to work for no pay for months and those that must support themselves and possibly others. […]
The governor, whose interns also work for free, says he supports a more modest increase of the state’s minimum wage.
Following a Tribune report on deaths of children in a privatized child welfare program, a state Department of Children and Family Services official said Tuesday that the agency has started taking back some of those cases from contract agencies and will handle them in-house.
Nora Harms-Pavelski, the agency’s deputy director of child protection, also disclosed at a legislative hearing Tuesday that agency administrators are now getting immediate reports on any instance of mistreatment of a child in the “intact family services” program, among other reforms.
The program, which serves roughly 2,700 children statewide, provides counseling, resources and oversight to keep families together instead of removing children from their home and placing them with strangers.
A surge in deaths began in 2012 after DCFS completely privatized the program, putting the care of families in the hands of nonprofit groups but doing little to evaluate the quality of their work, give them guidance and resources, or hold them accountable when children were hurt or put at risk, DCFS officials acknowledged in response to the Tribune investigation.
Illinois House Democrats on Tuesday endorsed [in committee] banning firepower-boosting “bump stocks,” the same device used by the Las Vegas gunman in the nation’s deadliest mass shooting three weeks ago. […]
“It’s a device used to kill and injure as many people as you can by modifying a semi-automatic weapon into an automatic weapon,” the legislation’s sponsor, Democratic Rep. Marin Moylan of Des Plaines, told the committee.
Critics call it an overreach because Moylan’s measure technically addresses “trigger modification.” It’s defined in part as any implement “intended to accelerate the rate of fire of a firearm.”
Sport-shooters routinely make after-market modifications to get an edge on firing speed, the National Rifle Association’s Todd Vandermyde testified. He labeled Moylan’s language so broad, “it would make a criminal out of the vast majority of the state’s 2.2 million” Illinois firearm-permit holders.
Todd Vandermyde, who represents the National Rifle Association, said Moylan’s bill is too broadly written and will effectively outlaw a number of trigger modifications that many gun owners legally have performed on their guns. Those modifications can increase the rate of fire, he said, but do not come close to turning the weapons into machine guns.
“This bill would essentially outlaw, in our estimation, 50 percent of the firearms (in Illinois),” he said. “It would make a criminal out of the vast majority of the 2.3 million FOID card holders for mere possession. This may be a response to what took place in Las Vegas, but the net result is criminalizing a lot of (gun owners).” […]
Vandermyde said the National Rifle Association is open to regulation of the bump stocks but does not want to see a total ban.
Moylan said he didn’t think his bill would have the far-reaching effects that Vandermyde said they would. He also rejected a comment from Vandermyde that the bill was a “knee-jerk” reaction to the Las Vegas shooting.
The bill passed a committee on a 7-5 vote, sending it to the House floor. Republicans voted against it. They favor a competing bill that would only apply the ban to bump stocks, not other devices. That measure, sponsored by Rep. Barbara Wheeler, R-Crystal Lake, has the backing of the Illinois State Rifle Association.
Wheeler contended Democrats’ bill “muddied the water,” noting that it would also require people to obtain a Firearm Owners Identification Card in order to purchase explosive components such as Tannerite, which is commonly used for target practice. Republican Gov. Bruce Rauner vetoed legislation passed earlier this year that put similar restrictions on Tannerite.
Moylan countered that Tannerite was found in the Las Vegas shooter’s car and said requiring a FOID card to buy it would allow it to be more easily tracked.
“Just because my bill tries to protect people, I shouldn’t do it? No. We have to act responsibly,” Moylan said.
[Rep. Jerry Costello II, D-Smithton] said he doesn’t believe the bill would pass the General Assembly.
“At the end of the day, when you look, a lot of liberal anti-gun groups that are in Chicago, in Northern Illinois, those are the ones who are right now pushing this legislation. It’s overly egregious,” Costello said. […]
State Rep. Katie Stuart, D-Edwardsville, said she hasn’t had time to fully read the legislation, but she thinks Moylan’s proposal goes too far.
“I do like looking at these issues at single things at a time, so we could really debate the individual things,” Stuart said. “I think sometimes bills throw a lot of things into the pot, and we’re not sure where someone stands on one specific item like the bump stocks.”
* Remember the post on Monday about how Gov. Rauner is pushing a federal proposal that could allow Illinois to void some of its pension costs through some sort of bankruptcy component?…
“We’ve got a bill now, we’re working with Congress. (If) Congress passed a law, we’re lobbying right now, allow states to restructure their pensions, supercede the restrictions that the special interest groups have put on the state,” Rauner said at the Sept. 28 event
“There’s not a specific proposal - it’s all part of conversations that have taken place in DC for a long time, is my understanding,” said governor’s office spokeswoman Patty Schuh. “The General Assembly is looking for ways to do it - the Attorney General argued for it because of the out-of-whack costs. But as we all know, the Supreme Court stepped in. If it’s necessary for the feds to provide state legislatures like Illinois some flexibility in addressing the costs that are strangling the budget … we’re open.”
We circled back with Congressman Peter Roskam after Rauner told the U.S. Chamber of Commerce he hoped to advance language allowing pension funds to file for bankruptcy reorganization through the tax overhaul that Roskam is helping lead.
That is not looking likely. The congressman’s office tells us that the issue seems better suited for the Judiciary committee and that Roskam is “hyperfocused on tax reform.”
“We’re happy to listen, but honestly the governor’s office has a lot of work to do to build a constituency for this kind of idea,” a Roskam office spokeswoman said.
* And this is from the Illinois Policy Institute’s news service…
But none of Illinois’ Republican congressional delegation would confirm this week that anyone from Rauner’s camp has approached them about a standalone proposal or one that would be tied in with the coming tax reform plan.
Rauner doesn’t have the best relationship with the GOP Congressmen. They strongly rebuked Rauner last month for his signing of a controversial bill allowing for the public funding of abortions.
An open letter outlining rampant sexual harassment in Illinois politics began circulating Monday and garnered signatures from more than 160 women and men vowing to demand better. […]
“A lot of us felt like it was just us — we were being singled out because we were young or we were alone or we were single,” [Katelynd Duncan, founder of political fundraising organization KJD Strategies] told me. “This demonstrates solidarity that there’s not a woman in this industry we know who hasn’t had this experience. It’s a testament to how long we’ve been experiencing this in the shadows and behind closed doors and keeping it to ourselves.” […]
In each of the explosive sexual harassment and sexual assault stories that have captured the public attention since Weinstein’s downfall, we’ve tended to focus — rightly — on the dehumanizing, demoralizing effect of power players preying on their less powerful subordinates.
But we shouldn’t ignore the equally dangerous chilling effect on women’s professional success, particularly as we’re made aware just how many industries the harassment and assault cut across.
“Women in politics are taught very early on there will be negative repercussions for speaking up,” Duncan said. “This type of behavior and this type of culture really deeply changes how women feel about themselves in the workplace, and they limit the opportunities they expose themselves to. You don’t want to go out to dinner with candidate x, y or z. You don’t want to stay out for drinks. You don’t want to meet them at their house to pick up some papers.
“I had a candidate who refused to pay me because I rejected him constantly, to go out to dinner or break up with my boyfriend, and I also had another candidate who fired me when I used the word inappropriate to his campaign,” Duncan said.
Duncan said her harassers include some elected officials who are still in office. She did not want to name them so as not to distract from the effort to change the culture. […]
“For every woman who feels comfortable talking about their experience, there are 100 women who are too afraid to share their story for fear of being fired, for fear of not being believed, for fear of public shaming,” Duncan said.
The issue isn’t just about the hazards women face in the workplace, supporters said – it’s also about the negative impact a toxic culture has on the policies that come from Springfield.
“I’ve devoted my life to fighting for a strong state, to fighting for a healthier planet, for healthier communities and ultimately this culture in Springfield is preventing us from having a stronger democracy,” [Kady McFadden with the Sierra Club] said.
“We’re the ones that pass legislation and laws, and if we can’t set the bar, if we can’t set the standard for how to behave, then shame on us,” added Duncan.
State Sen. Toi Hutchinson, who signed the open letter, said the campaign is not about naming names. It’s about making women feel they don’t have to be ashamed or silenced about their experiences.
“That open letter was never intended to start hauling people out of the Capitol and criminalizing a whole bunch of stuff. That’s not the issue. The issue is this survives in silence. And there are a number of people who are tired of being silenced,” said Hutchinson, D-Olympia Fields.
“Anytime you’re talking about changing the culture around something it starts with robust conversation. There used to be a time when you were the only black lobbyist in the room, you could hear people make racial jokes. And black folks had to grin and bear it if you want to work in the Capitol. There was a time when there were no women lobbyists. So for the first ones that were here, I can’t even imagine what it was like for them.” […]
State Rep. Ann Williams, D-Chicago, said she hopes the conversations expand from sexual harassment to battling sexism in politics.
“I think we get so used to it, it almost becomes something that we work around, coping mechanisms to get around sexism and sexual comments and the objectification of women. But I think the more deeper issue I want involved in any deeper conversation are the systemic issues that exist in the workplace for women and are alive and well in Springfield,” Williams said.
The solutions called for in the letter are for women to speak up, men to call out sexual harassment and voters to hold politicians who engage in sexual harassment accountable on Election Day.
One of the signers of the letter, State Representative Sara Feigenholtz, has also filed a resolution urging those in government to work on changing the culture in Springfield that the resolution says breeds sexual harassment.
* Meanwhile The Hill continues its series about problems at Statehouses throughout the country and our old friend Emily Miller was interviewed…
Miller recalled having to slip away from a colleague who tried to follow her back to her hotel room.
After the man was fired from his job for harassing another young woman, Miller called his boss to share her story. She got a quick view of how difficult it can be for women, whether they are lobbyists, aides or state lawmakers themselves, to get justice.
“I feel like I could have prevented this, but I didn’t think you would believe me,” Miller told the man’s boss.
“You’re right,” she said the boss told her. “We wouldn’t have.”
* Related…
* Mark Brown: Sadly, Springfield hasn’t outgrown boys’ club nonsense: It’s an awkward discussion, especially coming from a guy, because I know that some of the best insights and story tips can emerge from those after-hours conversations in Springfield’s bars and restaurants. And women shouldn’t have to exclude themselves just because men fail to recognize appropriate boundaries.
House Bill 3649, the Debt Transparency Act, is a good step toward providing increased oversight and better management of Illinois’ still-enormous backlog of unpaid bills. The Civic Federation supports and is encouraged by commonsense legislation that would provide for better public accounting of the State’s liabilities, particularly the requirement to identify interest penalties owed on past due bills.
It is reasonable to require state agencies to disclose certain information to the public on a regular basis, including the amount of bills being held by each agency and an estimate of late payment interest penalties for eligible liabilities. With increased access to this information in real time, legislators and executive leaders can make appropriate policy decisions to better manage the State’s obligations and prevent the backlog from growing. Taxpayers will be informed about whether their tax dollars are being efficiently spent.
Rauner said he vetoed the bill because it would make the bureaucrats work too hard. Awwww. That’s a real eyebrow raiser, governor. We’ve never heard a Republican make that kind of argument.
We don’t know exactly what prompted the reform-minded former investment fund manager to veto this common sense good-government measure, but we have a hunch: Perhaps he wants to hide the whole truth about how much the state owes people or companies that have provided services to the state and have not been paid. It would be an inconvenient truth on the campaign trail.
And perhaps he wants to hide the true condition of Illinois specifically from the young, up-and-coming Mendoza, an ambitious political dynamo with the charisma the good Lord denied Rauner. […]
Our main point remains: Illinois should be striving to open the processes of government to the taxpayers who must pay for decades of mismanagement.
We agree with the Better Government Association and newspaper editorial boards throughout Illinois in urging lawmakers to override Rauner’s veto, which is scheduled to come up for a vote Wednesday.
And I still haven’t seen a single editorial or independent opinion column arguing in favor of the governor’s position.
Republican Gov. Rauner’s new re-election ad unusually features three neighboring state GOP governors bragging about their job climate over Illinois. Now, another Republican governor is on the way to Illinois to try to poach jobs — Florida Gov. Rick Scott.
Scott’s office announced Tuesday he will be leading an economic development mission to Chicago later this week “to share why businesses in Chicago should consider moving their operations to Florida.”
“While Gov. Rauner has tried to grow Illinois’ economy, Chicago leaders and state legislators have for years been passing shortsighted policies and overwhelming increases of taxes and fees,” Scott said in a statement. […]
Not mentioned in the new ad or in Scott’s statement is that several Republican lawmakers broke with Rauner to enact the budget and spending package over the Illinois governor’s veto — effectively ending an historic budget stalemate that nearly sent the state into junk status, hiked unpaid bills and tattered the social service safety net.
Today, Governor Rick Scott announced he will be leading an economic development mission to Chicago this week to share why businesses in Chicago should consider moving their operations to Florida.
Governor Scott said, “Over the past seven years, we have cut taxes more than 75 times in Florida, saving our taxpayers more than $7 billion, and leading to the creation of more than 1.3 million private sector jobs. Florida’s success story is in stark contrast to the anti-business policies that have overburdened Chicago families and companies for far too long. That is why I will be leading an economic development mission to Chicago to meet with site selectors and job creators and encourage them to move to and invest in Florida.
“While Governor Rauner has tried to grow Illinois’ economy, Chicago leaders and state legislators have for years been passing shortsighted policies and overwhelming increases of taxes and fees. In fact, the average Chicago family today pays nearly $1,700 more in taxes and fees every year than they paid only seven years ago. While Florida has been able to pay down $7.6 billion in state debt and increase general revenues by more than 30 percent without raising taxes, Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel and city leaders announced yet another proposed round of burdensome tax and fee increases just last week. This follows the state legislature passing an increase to the state income tax earlier this summer- overriding Governor Rauner’s veto and strict opposition to such a burdensome tax increase. The entire nation needs to follow Florida’s lead- but until then, we will keep calling on businesses to move to Florida.”
* Meanwhile, Bernie wrote about the governor’s new ad as well today…
Now that Illinois is in competition with many other states to land a second headquarters for Amazon, does it make sense for Rauner to let other governors talk down Illinois to its own voters and beyond? Just asking.
It does, said Justin Giorgio, a spokesman for the Rauner campaign.
“With entrenched Democrats like Mike Madigan at the helm, Governor Rauner has vowed to pull out all the stops to make change in Illinois,” Giorgio said. “That includes having three successful governors help make his point that Illinois has to change and we need to get rid of Mike Madigan in order to grow.”
*** UPDATE 1 *** DGA…
After bashing Illinois’ economy for three years as governor, Bruce Rauner launched his reelection campaign by teaming up with out-of-state governors to attack Illinois’ economy. Rauner’s new ad skirts over the fact he’s been governor since 2015 and deflects any responsibilities for his failures.
Just hours later, Florida Governor Rick Scott announced he would come to Chicago in an attempt to lure away jobs. Gov. Scott parroted Rauner’s campaign message and joined in bashing Illinois’ economy – all while calling on companies to set up shop in Florida. Scott praised Gov. Rauner, without mentioning his two-year budget crisis, and said states need to follow Florida’s lead “but until then, we will keep calling on businesses to move to Florida.” Scott wrote “That is why I will be leading an economic development mission to Chicago to meet with site selectors and job creators and encourage them to move to and invest in Florida.”
All of this begs the question – is Governor Rauner okay with this?
“Bruce Rauner’s campaign message is being used by out-of-state governors to steal Illinois jobs,” said DGA Illinois Communications Director Sam Salustro. “Rauner may think it’s a good reelection strategy to highlight the lack of job growth under his failed leadership, but now his rhetoric could hurt middle-class workers even more. Rauner needs to stop putting his reelection before the needs of Illinois families.”
*** UPDATE 2 *** Pritzker campaign…
Florida Governor Rick Scott is in Chicago today openly poaching Illinois companies and badmouthing the state. But where is Bruce Rauner? Sitting by idly and letting it happen on his watch.
The State Journal Register put it this way: “Now that Illinois is in competition with many other states to land a second headquarters for Amazon, does it make sense for Rauner to let other governors talk down Illinois to its own voters and beyond? Just asking.”
“Just a day after Bruce Rauner invited three neighboring governors to bash the state he’s supposed to lead on TV, Rauner is letting yet another Republican governor take a swing at Illinois,” said Pritzker campaign spokeswoman Jordan Abudayyeh. “This failed governor has given up on growing our economy and is doubling down on his mission to drive the state’s reputation into the ground.”
* Ever have one of those mornings when literally everything seemed to go wrong? That was me today. Anyway, all is well now I think, so follow along with ScribbleLive…
