* The Commission on Government Forecasting and Accountability released a report today noting differences between its revenue forecasts and the forecasts used by the Governor’s Office of Management and Budget…

By removing the estimated $492 million in revenue adjustments proposed in the FY 2026 Budget Book, GOMB’s FY 2026 General Funds revenue forecast would be reduced from $55.453 billion to approximately $54.961 billion. However, the Commission’s FY 2026 estimate of $54.224 billion would still be $737 million lower than this “current law” adjusted figure, a difference of -1.3%.

• The primary differences between the adjusted GOMB estimate and the CGFA estimate are in the “big three” revenue sources. The Commission is taking a more cautious approach in its outlook for the Personal Income Tax [$414 million lower], the Corporate Income Tax [$370 million lower], and the Sales Tax [$187 million lower] in FY 2026 given the economic uncertainty related to potential federal changes, potential tariffs, and the volatile geopolitical climate.

• CGFA is slightly more optimistic in its outlook for All Other State Sources [$195 million higher] and Transfers In [$39 million higher]. CGFA adopts GOMB’s Federal Sources estimate due to its tie to anticipated spending.

* The current fiscal year’s revenue is also disputed…

• The Commission estimates that the State of Illinois is on pace to reach and slightly surpass the $53.281 billion assumed revenue total for the enacted FY 2025 General Funds budget.

• While the Commission’s $333 million upward adjustment in FY 2025 to $53.614 billion is below GOMB’s recently revised increase of $619 million to $53.900 billion, the $286 million difference between the two forecasts is only 0.5% apart.

• If income tax revenues come in strong during the upcoming final tax period, and if other revenue sources, such as the sales tax, continue to improve, the Commission could potentially make another upward revision in May.

* Senate Republicans…

Today, the bipartisan, bicameral Commission on Government Forecasting and Accountability (COGFA) released their updated revenue projections, painting Illinois Governor JB Pritzker’s budget as more than $1 billion out of balance.

“The independent COGFA numbers show the governor used aggressively inflated revenue projections to minimize the cuts or tax increases his budget would require to be balanced,” said Illinois Senate Republican Leader John Curran (R-Downers Grove). “This is why it is absolutely necessary that the governor rein in the spending on unsustainable non-citizen programs and prioritize the taxpayers he was elected to represent.”

The COGFA revenue report projects state revenues for the next fiscal year at $740 million below the figures that the governor used in his recent budget address. When removing the governor’s proposed changes to state law, as required by statute, the total deficit increases to $1.2 billion.

It should be noted that the budget proposed by the governor was once again heavily dependent on theoretical policies and tax increases that have not been proposed or approved by the General Assembly.

“I would like to say that I’m shocked that the governor’s plan is so far out of whack, but the truth is that we’ve been saying this all along,” said Senate Republican Chief Budgeteer Chapin Rose (R-Mahomet). “Every year the governor tells us he’s passed another balanced budget, only to find out the next year how upside-down his spending plan really was.”

Worse yet, if the governor fails to follow through on his promise of cutting spending for noncitizen healthcare, the total projected deficit will grow to $1.6 billion.

“While the governor spends his days chasing national headlines doing interviews on anything but the state he was elected to manage, this new report shows that his fuzzy math budget is out of balance by over $1 billion,” said State Senator Don DeWitte (R-St. Charles). “This means he and his Democratic allies will either have to cut spending, increase taxes or both. It is time for the governor to take a break from the national stage and focus on the dire financial situation he has created by irresponsible spending in our state.”

The COGFA report also projects a deficit for the current fiscal year of roughly $525 million. If the projections hold true, that would mean that the state has to cover a half a billion dollars of money for the previous year, before even dealing with the next fiscal year.

* From Alex Gough in the governor’s office…

Senate Republicans are living in a different world than hardworking families who are dealing with high costs that they are doing nothing to address. Governor Pritzker has proposed and passed six balanced budgets – all of which produced surpluses.

The Governor’s budget team has been clear with the legislature that Donald Trump and Republicans are creating national economic uncertainty from tariffs that are a tax on working families to reckless cuts to federal programs that people rely upon. The Governor’s budget team operates in reality and always uses the most up to date data available to us in our forecasts from outside firms like S&P. Instead of spreading falsehoods, I’d recommend they be transparent about their priorities and put together a budget proposal.