Q: Tell us what the message is, because we’ve been hearing from a lot of different business leaders quite publicly, as you know, who’ve been talking about the city of Chicago, the state of Illinois, and to be quite blunt about it, a lot of them say they want to get out.
Pritzker: Well, that’s not what we’re hearing, in fact, to you, but you saw that Kellogg moved to Chicago just recently. So just another example of corporate headquarters coming to Illinois, and we’re doing a lot to attract business and retain businesses. We had one business that left Citadel because, frankly, he lost a political election, trying to unseat me, and, you know, wanting to get out and made as an excuse that we have high crime but the reality [crosstalk] not about my run for reelection. he just decided he didn’t want me as governor and so he went after me, and spent $50 million trying to take me out. But the reality of Miami where they have a worse [crosstalk]
Q: You’re talking about [crosstalk] Citadel. Tell us about that, though. Did you guys ever have a conversation yourselves about this?
Pritzker: Not about my run for reelection. He just decided he didn’t want me as governor. And so he went after me and spent $50 million trying to take me out. And then another guy rich, Richard Uhlein, who owns Uline, spent another $55 million trying to take me out in the same election. And look, I you know, I’ve talked to Ken Griffin. I’ve known him for a number of years. We still have a major Citadel headquarters in Chicago, and quite a number of people still working there. They haven’t moved jobs. And we’re glad to have them in Illinois, but I’m sorry he left.
Q: But it’s not political to say for example, the CEO of McDonald’s, for example, has raised concerns about the security issues in Chicago.
Pritzker: And I’ve sat down with him to talk to him about that. I think his comments are not inappropriate to talk about the safety and security, public safety of people in the city of Chicago and and what that means for business, and we’re doing actually quite a lot to address that, both in crime prevention dollars applied so that we’re intervening on the street literally providing jobs for young people. And then of course, you know, we just passed the assault weapons ban in the state of Illinois and that’s going to help, but crime is coming down gradually in the city and across the state. It’s going to take a little while, these things don’t come down immediately. But it’s getting better.
Q: Governor, you know the other side would say that it’s, you know, no cash bail and lenient prosecutors. You got to approach it a whole different way. And I guess the mayor, obviously Chicago gets a lot of criticism on that as well. You’re sure that the cure that you’re prescribing is what needs to be done?
Pritzker: It’s working. And the reality is that when you talk about no cash bail, you know, people misunderstand that [crosstalk] that doesn’t mean that you’re just letting you double doors [crosstalk]
Q: By the way, the state of New York though we’ve had we have a similar issue. In fact an employee from Goldman Sachs was killed in in the subway, this just earlier this year, after somebody who was let out on bail, probably should not have clearly should not have been [crosstalk]
Pritzker: Exactly the point that is violent criminals shouldn’t be let out, right. But when you’ve got somebody who committed a non-violent offense, and frankly, that would be kept in jail…
Q: That’s a broken windows argument… ,
Pritzker: …because they just don’t have a few hundred dollars. That’s not a [crosstalk] it’s an injustice.
Q: Some people say, when you let the broken windows, that whole idea that if you let minor crimes go without any punishment, that it’s just, the whole environment seems to be more lenient, and it just leads to more serious crimes. You don’t adhere to that.
Pritzker: It’s the serious criminals that are, you know, they’re committing the violent crimes. So, those are the ones, it’s not people who are committing shoplifting that are going out…
Q: If 100 People, what if 100 People go in and steal from stores…
Pritzker: I understand. They should be held accountable. That’s not the suggestion that we’re not holding them accountable. The issue is that it’s violent criminals that need to be [crosstalk] without bail. Because right now, if you’re wealthy enough, you can simply buy your way out. You’re a wealthy drug dealer, you can buy your way out.
And then the video ends.
Lot of Mayor Giuliani hardliners on that network, apparently.
* Northeastern University researchers find little evidence for ‘broken windows theory,’ say neighborhood disorder doesn’t cause crime: More than 35 years ago, researchers theorized that graffiti, abandoned buildings, panhandling, and other signs of disorder in neighborhoods create an environment that leads people to commit more crime. In the “broken windows theory,” as it has come to be known, such characteristics convey the message that these places aren’t monitored and crime will go unpunished. The theory has led police to crack down on minor crimes with the idea that this will prevent more serious crimes, and inspired research on how disorder affects people’s health. Now, Northeastern researchers say they have debunked the “broken windows theory.” In research published in the Annual Review of Criminology and in Social Science & Medicine, they have found that disorder in a neighborhood doesn’t cause people to break the law, commit more crimes, have a lower opinion of their neighborhoods, or participate in dangerous or unhealthy behavior. “The body of evidence for the broken windows theory does not stand, in terms of how disorder impacts individuals,” said Daniel T. O’Brien, associate professor in the School of Public Policy and Urban Affairs and the School of Criminology and Criminal Justice at Northeastern.
* ADDED: Is Bail Reform Causing an Increase in Crime?: As jurisdictions throughout the U.S. consider reducing or eliminating the use of pretrial detention and cash bail, criminologists Don Stemen and David Olson of Loyola University Chicago examine whether crime has increased in places that have implemented bail reforms since 2017. In Is Bail Reform Causing an Increase in Crime?, the authors examine eleven jurisdictions that constrained or ended use of these long-established practices and found “no clear or obvious pattern” connecting bail reforms and violent crime. They conclude that “reducing pretrial detention and eliminating money considerations from decisions about detention have had minimal negative effects on public safety” and that, considering the harmful effects of pretrial detention on defendants, bail reforms might, in fact, “improve the well-being of communities most impacted by crime.”
- Montrose - Wednesday, Jan 18, 23 @ 1:18 pm:
If the interviewer offered data instead of anecdote that backed up his statements on business loss and the impacts of criminal reform, I would say he was asking good, hard questions. But he didn’t. It’s lazy and pandering.
- Socially DIstant Watcher - Wednesday, Jan 18, 23 @ 1:19 pm:
The arguments for and against “broken windows” are completely different from the arguments for and against ending cash bail. That questioner didn’t know what from what.
- Stan - Wednesday, Jan 18, 23 @ 1:21 pm:
Joe Kernan has moved to clown status on that network.
- CentralILCentrist - Wednesday, Jan 18, 23 @ 1:21 pm:
Please read the NU article cited at the end of the post. It does not “debunk” BW theory. It calls into question the methodologies of prior research. Intersectional theories are much more encompassing these days than prior research. It’s good to question and investigate, rather than armchair analysis.
“There are other ways to think about disorder,” says O’Brien, who co-directs the Boston Area Research Initiative, which is based at Northeastern’s School of Public Policy and Urban Affairs. “It’s not to say we should look at neighborhoods and say, ‘You know, graffiti and abandoned buildings don’t matter.’ It’s that they matter, but they didn’t matter in a way that the broken windows theory claims that they do.”
- Arsenal - Wednesday, Jan 18, 23 @ 1:22 pm:
Very interesting that the business station resorted to doing an ooga booga on crime.
- Nick - Wednesday, Jan 18, 23 @ 1:23 pm:
Reading the transcript it sounds like he handled that as deftly as you could hope. The New York media went absolutely insane about their bail reform, even with the near total lack of evidence that it was a contributing factor to increased crime.
- Anyone Remember - Wednesday, Jan 18, 23 @ 1:24 pm:
As long as people want things that society has made illegal, there’ll be crime.
- Baloneymous - Wednesday, Jan 18, 23 @ 1:31 pm:
Andrew Ross Sorkin has typically been more levelheaded and rational for as long as I’ve watched him on CNBC. Joe Kernen, on the other hand, is as bad as Larry Kudlow was and 100% focused on Wall Street and corporate greed. And Kernen’s quip on ‘banning assault rifles isn’t gonna do anything…’ He’s just getting in as many jabs as he could since JB was putting him in his place on what is actually going on. Kernen might as well been spouting Darren Bailey talking points. He doesn’t really care about crime.
- Torco Sign - Wednesday, Jan 18, 23 @ 1:42 pm:
The “broken windows” argument is strangely applied here. That said, it has been disingenuous for some to suggest that we have an epidemic of rich people buying their way out of jail when the same people (rightly) say how disproportionately black and brown the jails are. Democrats, including Pritzker, need to fine-tune their argument.
- Larry Bowa Jr. - Wednesday, Jan 18, 23 @ 1:45 pm:
“it’s not political to say for example, the CEO of McDonald’s, for example, has raised concerns about the security issues in Chicago.”
These people are forever unable to hear themselves, because unlike class traitor JB Pritzker, they don’t interact with anyone outside their privileged little bubbles, which are places where you can state that the CEO of McDonald’s doesn’t have any politics and nobody laughs or points out to you how stupid you sound.
- Rich Miller - Wednesday, Jan 18, 23 @ 1:55 pm:
=== suggest that we have an epidemic of rich people buying their way out of jail===
It mostly ain’t rich people, it’s gangs and drug networks. Otherwise known as organized crime.
- Arsenal - Wednesday, Jan 18, 23 @ 2:05 pm:
==it has been disingenuous for some to suggest that we have an epidemic of rich people buying their way out of jail when the same people (rightly) say how disproportionately black and brown the jails are.==
Uh, those two things don’t seem to contradict?
- Perrid - Wednesday, Jan 18, 23 @ 2:11 pm:
“Some people say, when you let the broken windows, that whole idea that if you let minor crimes go without any punishment, that it’s just, the whole environment seems to be more lenient, and it just leads to more serious crimes. …”
If you don’t want to release anyone before trial, push for that law. But these people haven’t been convicted yet, they are presumed innocent, so the “punishment” he wants should follow the conviction, not be prior to it.
- Big Dipper - Wednesday, Jan 18, 23 @ 2:29 pm:
What people forget about Giuliani is that prior to 9/11 he had fallen out of favor with New Yorkers. The NYPD was viewed as an occupying army in minority neighborhoods and there was the famous “41 shots” killing of an innocent man.
- Annonin' - Wednesday, Jan 18, 23 @ 2:58 pm:
This could have been two topics.
The CNBC crew seems determined to hype the Griffie mish mash. JB did spend a lot of time answering without telling his story.
Meanwhile the authors of the new study seem to believe broken windows drives residents of neighborhoods to commit crimes. We have always thought the look of the neighborhood led to indifference and then more bad stuff … so fix the windows slumlord. The new guys looked at hundreds of other studies to come to their “findings” The press release gave us a headache so we’ll take a break before lookin’ at the data
- Springfieldish - Wednesday, Jan 18, 23 @ 3:09 pm:
When the questions repeatedly start with “some people say,” they’re not serious reporters.
- Shytown - Wednesday, Jan 18, 23 @ 5:22 pm:
It’s so easy to be a talking head and spit out questions without having any real understanding of how all this works. But you keep being you, Mr. CNBC.
- The Dude - Wednesday, Jan 18, 23 @ 7:40 pm:
Ive heard many on the left say good ridance to Ken Griffin but I researched the issue and I’m upset about how much IL is losing because he is leaving.
Like him or not he was the 2nd highest paying person in the united states and a lot of state taxes were brought him by him.
This is a huge hit for the future of IL but JB is likely not the main issue here. It looks like Mayor Lightfoot was reason #1.
- Oswego Willy - Wednesday, Jan 18, 23 @ 7:48 pm:
===Like him or not he was the 2nd highest paying person in the united states and a lot of state taxes were brought him by him.
This is a huge hit for the future of IL===
The reality is, outside the CNBC silly of pinning down Pritzker to seem to “feel bad” Illinois lost a wealthy guy…
… there’s this odd thing that Griffin has this need to feel “loved” for his money or be deemed important by his money.
For every tax dollar we “lose”, think about the real damage Griffin and Rauner did to Illinois… that’s more than a price tag too.
Let Griffin feel “missed” or let Griffin feel he’s like really important, but what is ridiculous is this ego-driven need for love or to feel missed when all that money should make “self worth” easy to find… it’s kinda sad Griffin can’t find his own self worth without the 4th grader “yeah, well, they’ll be sorry”
Yeah. We won’t feel sorry. *I* feel sorry for Griffin, sure…
- Anyone Remember - Wednesday, Jan 18, 23 @ 10:55 pm:
Big Dipper -
Andrew Kirtzman’s book talks about that.