* The debate begins at 6 on ABC 7 Chicago. Click here for live video if you need it. Here’s our usual ScribbleLive thingy. I’ll add candidate press releases, other react, etc. to it as we go along…
Democratic Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan has opened a criminal probe into how Republican Gov. Bruce Rauner’s administration handled deadly Legionnaires’ disease outbreaks at the state-run Quincy veterans’ home, law-enforcement sources confirmed exclusively to WBEZ on Wednesday.
Madigan’s office contacted Adams County State’s Attorney Gary Farha to say it had plans to present a case to a criminal grand jury empaneled in the west-central Illinois community where the Illinois Veterans’ Home is based, the sources said.
Who within Rauner’s orbit Madigan may be targeting and what criminal laws may be at issue are unclear, but a spokeswoman for the four-term attorney general who is retiring in January said her office’s probe has been ongoing.
“We are investigating whether any laws were violated in the response to the risks of and outbreak of Legionella at the Quincy veterans’ home, where many people died,” Madigan spokeswoman Maura Possley said in a statement.
“There needs to be an investigation to determine if laws were violated and whether residents of the home, their families, veterans’ home staff, and the public were informed in a timely and appropriate manner,” she said.
* From earlier today…
A new report from WBEZ confirms Gov. Bruce Rauner’s Administration withheld information that could have saved lives at the Illinois Veterans Home at Quincy, and State Senator Tom Cullerton (D-Villa Park) is calling for a criminal inquiry.
“This report confirms that the governor’s office deliberately delayed notifying families and the public of a deadly Legionnaires’ disease outbreak,” Cullerton said. “This goes beyond negligence. This is willful endangerment of a vulnerable population that it is our sacred duty to protect. This is criminal neglect.”
Legionnaires’ disease claimed the lives of 14 veterans or their spouses at the Quincy home and sickened nearly 70 residents and staff. Now, state records show that Rauner’s administration waited weeks – and in some cases months – in 2016 and 2017 to publicly acknowledge additional cases of Legionnaires’ disease.
“Gov. Bruce Rauner prioritized political games over the lives of our U.S. service men and women and staff at the state-run veterans’ home,” Cullerton said.
Cullerton is urging the Illinois Attorney General’s office to consider criminal charges against Gov. Rauner and any other officials directly involved in the decisions to conceal the truth.
“If residents, loved ones and staff had all of the facts better decisions could have been made that would have saved lives,” Cullerton said. “The governor and his administration need to be held accountable.”
There is precedent for such charges. In Michigan, Attorney General Bill Schuette brought charges against high-ranking state and former city of Flint health officials related to the Flint drinking water crisis. Cullerton believes similar charges should be considered in Illinois.
“We need to find out how many more deaths were caused by exposure to Legionnaires’ disease at the veterans home. We need a larger investigation to further examine their criminal negligence,” he said.
Cullerton served in the Army from 1990 to 1993 as an infantryman and has been a staunch advocate for Illinois’ veterans, especially those at the Quincy home.
“The state of Illinois has failed to give the veterans at the home the same basic dignity they put their lives on the line to protect for all of us,” Cullerton said. “There has to be some accountability for those that willfully endanger the heroes under our care to save political face.”
…Adding… You may recall not long ago when AG Madigan’s office was asked about investigating corruption stemming from an inspector general probe, her spokesperson said this…
But if we get that referral, we have to ask the permission of the appropriate State’s Attorney to use his or her grand jury - which means we have to ask permission to handle the case and if the State’s Attorney wants to take it or do it jointly with us, we do not have an option.
She’ll be presenting to a standing grand jury that will convene in late October. WBEZ quotes the Adams County State’s Attorney in its piece…
Farha, a Republican, said he would not be participating in any prosecution and that it would be lawyers from Madigan’s office appearing before a grand jury. […]
Asked if he believed election-year dynamics may be at play, Farha responded, “One could wonder.”
…Adding… Funny how all this is happening on the day of a debate that could’ve been dominated by Pritzker’s property tax problems…
“After four years of outbreaks, 14 deaths, and nearly 70 cases of Legionnaires’ at the Quincy Veterans’ Home, Bruce Rauner’s administration is now the subject of a criminal investigation into their fatal mismanagement and cover-up,” said JB Pritzker. “While Rauner’s own office tried to keep the Legionnaires’ crisis under wraps — delaying notification to the public and selectively releasing state records to the media — Veterans, their spouses, and staff at the home continued to get sick and die on this failed governor’s watch. Their families deserve justice, and Bruce Rauner must be held accountable.”
The Pritzker campaign has been throwing everything it has at Rauner this week to try and move tonight’s debate toward anywhere but the property tax stuff. It’s a good plan. I’m just sayin…
…Adding… WCIA…
AG Madigan's office immediately confirms this criminal investigation w/ me via phone. In contrast, after a day of un-returned phone calls they're still reluctant to comment on allegations of criminal tax fraud facing J.B. Pritzker-"It's unclear if that's w/in our jurisdiction." https://t.co/D3hfdqlray
Madigan opens criminal probe looking for a crime. What crime? They don’t know & can’t say. Earlier today, we asked if they would look into Cook County IG’s report alleging @JBPritzker committed a “scheme to defraud.” They said probably not because he was a private citizen. https://t.co/smSu6s1ekv
“During her 16 years in office, Attorney General Lisa Madigan has done absolutely nothing to address the corruption from Speaker Mike Madigan and Illinois Democrats that has plagued our state for decades. But now that an independent investigation has found her party’s candidate for governor to be a tax fraud, Madigan has launched a clearly partisan investigation into a serious public health crisis that Governor Rauner took swift action on and has been transparent with the General Assembly and the media. This is nothing more than the politicization of the devastating deaths of Illinois veterans to distract from JB Pritzker’s scheme to defraud Illinois taxpayers hours before a debate.” - Illinois Republican Party Executive Director Travis Sterling
Today, the Pritzker campaign released a new TV ad, “Throw,” ahead of the second gubernatorial debate.
In 2014, Bruce Rauner said, “give me four years, and I’ll say to the voters, ‘throw me out of office in four years if I don’t deliver results.’” After four years of failure, it’s clear Rauner hasn’t delivered results.
“For four years, Bruce Rauner has utterly failed Illinois — creating a two-year budget crisis while over a million Illinoisans lost services and holding up funding for neighborhood public schools while property taxes increased across the state,” said Pritzker campaign communications director Galia Slayen. “One thing Rauner might actually accomplish is his prediction from 2014: not delivering results and getting thrown out of office.”
President Donald Trump’s record in office may prove a drag on Republican candidates for state offices and for the US House of Representatives in Illinois. That is one of the findings of the latest Simon Poll® from the Paul Simon Public Policy Institute at Southern Illinois Carbondale.
The results are based on live telephone interviews with 715 likely voters, a subset of 1,001 registered voters polled statewide. The margin of error for the likely voter sample is plus or minus 3.7 percentage points.
In addition to Trump’s effect on votes for Illinois offices, the tax reform bill passed last December by the Republican-controlled Congress is unpopular among Illinois voters, and may prove to further hinder the success of GOP Congressional candidates.
More than half (54 percent) of likely voters surveyed said “President Donald Trump’s record in office” made them less likely to vote for Republican candidates for state office in Illinois. Most of those (47 percent) said the president’s record made them much less likely to vote for Republican candidates. By contrast, just under a third (30 percent) said the president’s record made them more likely to vote for GOP candidates for state offices; about a quarter (24 percent) said his record made them much more likely to vote for Republicans.
Large majorities in Chicago (69 percent) and the collar county suburbs (59 percent) said the president’s record would make them less likely to vote for Republicans for state office, compared with about four in ten (39 percent) downstate.
Most Republican voters said the president’s record would make them more likely to support GOP candidates (76 percent), while most Democrats said his record would make them less likely (83 percent). Among Independents, about twice as many said Trump’s record would make them less likely to support GOP candidates for state offices (50 percent) than said it would make them more likely (23 percent).
“We’re not surprised that President Trump’s record is unpopular among Democrats and in urban areas,” said Charlie Leonard, a Simon Institute visiting professor and one of the supervisors of the poll. “What has to concern Republican candidates is his negative impact on votes among Independents and in the suburbs—voters the GOP needs for success statewide.”
The results were similar when interviewers asked about Trump’s record and its effect on their votes for Republican candidates for Congress: 54 percent said it would make them less likely to vote for GOP Congressional candidates, while 32 percent said the president’s record would make them more likely to do so.
Impacts were the same as those for state offices by partisan group and geography. Eight in ten (80 percent) Republicans said the president’s record would make them more likely to vote for GOP Congressional candidates, while eight in ten Democrats (84 percent) said it would make them less likely. As before, his record was twice as likely to have a negative impact than a positive impact on GOP votes for Congress among Independents (50 percent negative vs. 25 percent positive).
Most Chicago and collar county voters (69 percent and 59 percent) said Trump’s record would make them less likely to vote for Republicans in Congress. About four in ten downstate voters (39 percent) said its impact would be negative while 47% said its impact would be positive.
The tax reform bill passed last December by the Republican-controlled Congress and signed by President Trump is unpopular among Illinois voters, according to the Simon Poll. Half (54 percent) oppose it, and about a third (32 percent) support it.
Among those with an opinion on the tax bill, most (56 percent), as before, say it will make them less likely to support Republican candidates for Congress, while about a third (33 percent) say it will make them more so.
Negative electoral impacts from the tax bill were larger in Chicago (70 percent) and its suburbs (63 percent). Downstate, half (51 percent) said the tax bill would make them more likely to support Republican Congressional candidates, while about four in ten (38 percent) said it would make them less likely.
Partisan differences were predictable, with eight in ten Republicans reporting a positive electoral impact from the tax bill (83 percent), and nearly nine in ten Democrats (86 percent) reporting a negative one. Independents were more likely by 20 percentage points to report that the tax bill would make them less likely to vote for a Republican for Congress than to say it would make them more likely to do so (48 percent vs. 28 percent).
“President Trump’s record in office and the GOP tax cuts are only a net asset for Republican candidates downstate, and only the tax cuts garner a narrow majority for the Republicans there. In Illinois a least, both are unlikely to give a significant boost to Republican candidates”, said John S. Jackson, one of the co-directors of the poll.
Peter Roskam was one of the top drivers of that tax bill and nearly two-thirds of suburbanites oppose it. Oof.
The Illinois EPA has ordered Sterigenics to cease operations in Willowbrook until their safety investigation into carcinogenic emissions is completed, as political pressure mounts to close the facility.
Sterigenics did not respond publically to this latest move by the state to address concerns residents in Willowbrook and surrounding towns have about emissions of ethylene oxide from the plant. But the political pressure is mounting to shut them down until it’s known whether what they’re doing inside their facilities is safe for the communities around them.
After an Illinois Senate Committee hearing to look into the matter was cancelled Tuesday at the Thompson Center, residents and representatives went outside to demand the closure of Sterigenics.
Among them was Hall of Fame baseball player Jim Thome and his family, who moved to Willowbrook seven years ago
Mrs. Thome has been taking the lead so far, so this is new.
Andrea Thome, wife of baseball Hall of Famer and former White Sox star Jim Thome, said she had a “lightbulb moment” when she heard of the federal report released in August, because her mother had died from liver cancer and her father had suffered a brain tumor after moving into the area.
“Both of my parents were very healthy,” Thome said. “We asked them to move here to help us raise our kids” in the western suburbs, and they settled a mile from the Sterigenics operation. “I’m sorry,” she added, “but I don’t believe in coincidence that much.”
She said she’d written a blog post about her parents’ ailments, and many local residents had responded with similar stories.
“This is personal to us,” Jim Thome said. “Sterigenics has been poisoning the air in our community for a long, long time.”
Today, DPI Executive Director Christian Mitchell and families impacted by Sterigenics held a press conference on the Rauner-owned company releasing cancer-causing toxins into the community and the Rauner administration refusing to take immediate action to shut down the facility and protect our children.
Bruce Rauner downplayed the U.S. EPA report when it came to light on August 28, saying “this is not an emergency, this is not a public health immediate crisis,” as his administration delayed and refused to release key records. But yesterday, 35 days later, Rauner’s administration said, “we believe Sterigenics should pause operations.” Rauner’s 180 may be attributed to weeks of public outcry, impeding lawsuits, and the U.S. EPA conducting more extensive air pollutions tests, but he refuses to come clean.
The Tribune previously reported that quick action is unlikely for a variety of reasons, including steps the Rauner administration took before and after the Willowbrook cancer report was released to the public in late August.
Nearly two months earlier, the Illinois EPA responded to the then-secret report by quietly giving Sterigenics a permit to voluntarily install new pollution-control equipment, making it more difficult for authorities to pursue legal action against the company unless it can be proved that the fix has failed to eliminate health risks from ethylene oxide pollution.
Rauner appointees later refused to provide Madigan’s office with key documents about the Willowbrook facility, required the attorney general’s staff to request the records under the Freedom of Information Act and delayed providing the information until after the Tribune inquired about the dispute on Sept. 20. Even now, Madigan said, the state can’t make an effective case against Sterigenics without more air quality monitoring in surrounding neighborhoods, expert analysis of the results and other information that only the state or federal EPA can provide.
“We are prepared to move forward in court and have told IEPA what evidence is necessary to shut the site down,” Madigan said. “IEPA has not provided any evidence, but we will immediately evaluate any information the agency provides.”
* Also…
This behavior is what makes me thing that this “temporary” shutdown is more election year gymnastics. We will not settle for less than a permanent shutdown. We are watching and we are preparing. #stopsterigenics#twillhttps://t.co/2TMILkUe53
Today, Erika Harold’s campaign for Attorney General is launching a new TV ad titled “Reality.”
Erika Harold knows what it’s like to feel marginalized and powerless. In high school, Erika was the victim of bullying and sexual harassment. That experience of powerlessness is why Erika wanted to become an attorney - to acquire the skills to stand up not only for herself but also for others.
Erika Harold: When I was in high school, #MeToo wasn’t a slogan. It was my reality.
I overcame bullying and sexual harassment with my parents support, but too many women and children suffer alone, unseen or ignored by those in power.
I’m Erika Harold. I won’t rest until we shut down every human sex trafficking ring in Illinois, put every child predator behind bars, and make sure every victim of sexual harassment and assault knows the Attorney General has their back.
* Both Gov. Bruce Rauner and JB Pritzker have said they want to fund a capital construction plan at least partly with money from gaming expansion. But this is a very good point…
According to the Illinois Department of Transportation, maintaining Illinois’ existing highway and transit infrastructure will require approximately $1.7 billion in additional annual funding. Additionally, the State faces a $7.0 billion backlog of deferred maintenance at State facilities […]
Initiate a new capital plan with a comprehensive analysis and prioritization of the State’s infrastructure needs, funded by a n increase in the motor fuel tax and potentially by vehicle miles traveled and congestion taxes
House Republican Leader Jim Durkin (R-Western Springs) and State Representative and Grant Wehrli (R-Naperville) introduced legislation to make property tax vacancy fraud a Class 4 felony in Illinois after a Cook County Inspector General found that J.B. Pritzker knowingly committed fraud to avoid paying $330,000 in taxes.
“The Cook County Inspector General’s report made it very clear that J.B. Pritzker has defrauded all the taxpayers of Cook County.” said Durkin. “The General Assembly needs to address this issue to make sure those who commit fraud are held accountable.”
The report found that Pritzker knowingly removed all the toilets from his mansion to deem it uninhabitable in order to evade hundreds of thousands of dollars in taxes. This new legislation will bring forth serious criminal charges to those who think they deserve more of a tax break than the hard-working citizens of Illinois.
“Why should Mr. Pritzker, an inherited billionaire who hasn’t worked a day in his life, get to save hundreds of thousands in taxes when the people of Illinois are working tirelessly just to make ends meet?” asked Wehrli. “It is clear Mr. Pritzker will only put his own self-interests above the taxpayers, and now more than ever we don’t need another Democrat who manipulates the system to benefit his own pockets.”
Provides that a person commits property tax vacancy fraud when he or she knowingly owns vacant property and, for 2 or more consecutive years in which vacancy relief is granted, has not actively attempted to sell, lease, or alter the vacant property. Provides that property tax vacancy fraud is a Class A misdemeanor. Provides that a person commits aggravated property tax vacancy fraud when he or she commits property tax vacancy fraud that leads to the assessment of more than $100,000 in back taxes. Provides that aggravated property tax vacancy fraud is a Class 4 felony.
Buoyed in part by a strong stock market, the 400 wealthiest Americans delivered yet another record-breaking year. The minimum net worth needed to join this elite club climbed to $2.1 billion, $100 million more than last year and the highest to date. The group’s total net worth rose to $2.9 trillion, a record high and 7% more than in 2017. The average net worth of a list member: $7.2 billion, up from $6.7 billion last year. That average is boosted by those at the very top of the list: half of the total wealth is held by the 45 richest people in the country.
For the first time since 1994, there is a new No. 1: Amazon.com founder and CEO Jeff Bezos, who broke Bill Gates’ 24 year run at the top. Bezos is also the first person to appear in the ranks with a fortune of more than $100 billion –he clocked in at $160 billion. Bezos was also the biggest gainer on this year’s list: his fortune rose $78.5 billion since last year, thanks to the more than 100% runup in the price of Amazon stock, the biggest one year gain since we’ve been tracking fortunes. Gates, now ranked No. 2, trails Bezos by a notable $63 billion. The top 10 richest on the list are together worth nearly $730 billion, up from $610 billion in 2017. At these lofty heights, more than a third of the nation’s billionaires, a record 204, weren’t wealthy enough to crack the club.
45 Ken Griffin $10B hedge funds
114 Sam Zell $5.6B real estate, private equity
172 Thomas Pritzker $4.2B hotels, investments
179 Neil Bluhm $4B 80 real estate
215 Joe Mansueto $3.6B investment research
223 Mark Walter $3.5B finance
251 J.B. Pritzker $3.2B hotels, investments
251 Jean (Gigi) Pritzker $3.2B hotels, investments
280 Patrick Ryan $2.9B insurance
302 Penny Pritzker $2.7B hotels, investments
316 Ty Warner $2.6B real estate, plush toys
328 Joseph Grendys $2.5B poultry processing
328 Eric Lefkofsky $2.5B Groupon
The billionaire no more is Rishi Shah, co-founder of Outcome Health, which puts TV screens airing health information in doctors’ offices. Shah made his debut on last year’s list, ranking 206 with a net worth of $3.6 billion. Since then, Outcome Health has fallen from grace. Last year, investors sued the firm, charging that it had inflated its financial results. The U.S. Justice Department also investigated. […]
Of the Illinois residents on the list, only J.B. Pritzker, Warner and Grendys dropped in the rankings.
Looks like JB’s campaign spending has eaten into that fortune of his. Forbes estimated his net worth at $3.4 billion last year, when he ranked 219th richest. Pritzker has given his campaign $146.5 million.
* Greg Hinz asks a question that’s on a lot of minds: Who leaked Cook County Inspector General Patrick Blanchard’s “confidential” report on JB Pritzker’s alleged property tax scheme?…
Blanchard declined to answer questions about his report. But it states that it went to five—and only five—people: outgoing County Assessor Joe Berrios, who set the tax assessment on the Astor Street house; County Treasurer Maria Pappas, who mailed refund checks to Pritzker’s agents; and County Board President Toni Preckwinkle and two of her top aides.
Someone in that group had to leak the report. Blanchard, Pappas and Preckwinkle say it wasn’t them, and there’s good reason to think that Berrios hadn’t even read it yet. But the damaging report came out just a month to a day before the election, and as one top political insider puts it, “Things like this don’t happen in Chicago by accident.” […]
Which leads back to the question of who leaked the report. It appears not to be Rauner, since all of those who got the report are Democrats.
Some are speculating that Preckwinkle, who now is running for mayor and could use backing from state Democratic Chairman Mike Madigan, let the report out to weaken Pritzker some in the battle for dominance that’s likely to occur between Madigan and Pritzker next year. Preckwinkle’s office denies that.
The other person on that list, of course, is Blanchard, along with anyone else at the IG’s office who worked on the report. But I should stress that I have no knowledge that his office is the source of the leak.
As I told subscribers yesterday, Speaker Madigan probably wouldn’t mind a weakened Pritzker. But, Preckwinkle’s office has denied leaking it. I have no info to the contrary.
Treasurer Pappas flatly denied to me yesterday that she leaked the report, even though I didn’t ask. Assessor Berrios’ spokesman was claiming as late as yesterday afternoon that Berrios had still never even seen the report.
IG Blanchard told me this yesterday…
I emailed the report on Friday at 4:59 pm to Assessor Berrios and cc:d the other recipients in the same email. I did not receive an undeliverable notification from any recipient. The original letter was hand delivered on Monday morning to Assessor Berrios.
Berrios has a reputation for not checking his e-mails, but his spokesman told me that no one from the office says they got the hand-delivered report Monday, including Berrios.
* I’m bound by my word as to how I obtained a copy of the IG report. But I will say I didn’t get it from anyone on the list of senders or recipients or anyone else mentioned above or anyone associated with any of those folks. As far as I can tell, I didn’t get it either directly or indirectly from the reporter who broke the story, Tina Sfondeles, and the Sun-Times didn’t post the full report online until after I did. I don’t know if Tina and I received it from the same person because she’s also bound by her word and I would never ask her to break it. I also have no idea how the person who sent me the report obtained it.
The role private schools should play in Illinois’ public education landscape is turning out to be a major divide in the state’s gubernatorial race, with Republican Gov. Bruce Rauner saying he wants to expand a taxpayer-funded program to send children to private schools, while Democratic challenger J.B. Pritzker is vowing to shut it down.
“I’d like to have a billion dollar program,” Rauner told WBEZ and Chalkbeat Chicago in a one-hour election special on the future of education in Illinois. “We started with $100 million. Let’s expand it every year.”
A billion dollars? The Invest in Kids program is $100 million now, which would cost the state $75 million in tax credits if the program ever receives $100 million in donations from the public. So, a billion dollar plan would theoretically cost the state $750 million. Yikes.
As of today, however, Illinoisans have pitched in just $46.6 million to the program. If there isn’t enough market support for a $100 million program, I’m thinking a billion is just a wee bit out of reach. And nobody should be talking about any sort of expansion until far more Illinoisans decide the program is worthwhile.
* Over to JB Pritzker…
.@JBPritzker says he's against end-of-career teacher pension spiking, but he says supports union-backed effort to reverse law that caps spiking to 3% (or else district, not state takes on the pension cost) https://t.co/sLIQMtXyxt
The new law reduced the spiking limit from 6 percent to 3. It was the product of bipartisan negotiations. The locals can still give out end of career raises, but they’ll have to pay for them. I’m pretty sure we’re the only state that pays the government’s side of teacher pensions. But, of course, our property taxes here are way too high and shifting costs would only make that problem worse. We really are in a pickle.
* Pat Quinn spent two years gathering tens of thousands of signatures to put a mayoral term limits question on the ballot this year, then went to the trouble of filing a lawsuit, which was tossed out because he didn’t do a very simple thing…
Former governor Pat Quinn’s drive to get a binding referendum on the Nov. 6 ballot imposing a two-term limit on Chicago mayors suffered a setback [last week] when a judge tossed out his lawsuit on a technicality.
Undaunted, Quinn vowed to re-file the lawsuit on Friday; that’s allowed because it was dismissed “without prejudice” after he failed to notify the two objectors.
It turns out Chicagoans can cast a vote on whether to impose term limits on their mayor after all.
The only catch is that, as the situation currently stands, those votes won’t count.
The Chicago Board of Election Commissioners ruled earlier this month that two binding referendum questions advanced by former Gov. Pat Quinn were legally invalid and should not appear on the Nov. 6 ballot.
But election officials went ahead and included the referendums on the ballot anyway because of concerns their decision might later be overturned in the courts, a board spokesman said. […]
Although voters will be allowed to vote on the questions, the elections board will not officially report the results unless ordered to do so by the courts, [election board spokesman Jim Allen] said.
Brian Gaines, a political science professor at the University of Illinois in Urbana-Champaign, said Pritzker, as the frontrunner in several polls, is in “run-out-the-clock mode.”
“Pritzker will stand by his charge that Rauner’s term was a failure, that the budget mess, and indeed, the awful fiscal situation the state is in are all Rauner’s fault,” Gaines said. “Don’t expect him to open new fronts. Campaigns are usually conservative when they’re out front.”
As for Rauner, Gaines said Rauner must expand on his themes and try to emphasize “Pritzker’s untrustworthiness on taxes,” both his progressive income tax plan and his “vanishing toilets.”
“If it were me, I’d not dwell on the accusation of fraud so much as the point that ‘JB will raise your taxes, viewers and listeners, not only mine, and not his. He will just evade his own tax bill yet again,’” Gaines said.
My own view is Rauner should say something like: “He’ll evade his own taxes by any means necessary, including outright fraud.”
Your thoughts?
By the way, we’ll have live coverage of tonight’s ABC 7 debate, which begins at 6.
The hourlong debate will air live at 6 p.m. on ABC-7 and will stream live on the station’s website. It’s co-sponsored by Univision Chicago and the League of Women Voters of Illinois Education Fund.
Unlike their first televised appearance on Sept. 20, the Wednesday forum will feature only Republican Gov. Bruce Rauner and Pritzker.
Libertarian candidate Grayson “Kash” Jackson and Republican state Sen. Sam McCann of Plainview, running as the Conservative Party candidate, each failed to receive 10 percent of the vote in independent polls and were not invited to participate.
A decision is expected Thursday on Gov. Bruce Rauner’s move to prop up the coal power industry in Illinois by easing clean-air rules, a change critics say is an unneeded benefit to a large energy company that will lead to more pollution-related deaths and sickness.
The Illinois Pollution Control Board, a state rule-making panel, is expected to decide whether to end current clean-air requirements for eight downstate coal-fired power plants.
Existing rules dictate that owner Dynegy run its cleanest coal plants — those with the best pollution controls — to balance toxins emitted by its dirtiest plants. The board is being asked by the Rauner administration to replace that rule with one that imposes an annual cap on total emissions opponents say will allow greater amounts of toxins to be released into the air.
It’s a plan being driven by economics — coal power plants have a hard time competing with other sources of energy in Illinois, said Gerald Keenan, a former board member and past chairman of the pollution board. […]
The problem with the Rauner plan, according to health and environmental groups and Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan, is that it would allow the dirtiest plants to operate more frequently. They also criticize what they call the high caps proposed by Rauner’s Illinois Environmental Protection Agency that they say could allow for a doubling of what is already tens of thousands of tons of harmful sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxide emissions released into the air every year.
All but one of the pollution panel’s five members were appointed to the board by Rauner. If it sides with the governor, the new coal plan still has one more regulatory hurdle to cross before it can go into effect — approval from a bipartisan panel of House and Senate lawmakers. […]
Dynegy, bought this year for more than $2 billion by Texas-based Vistra Energy, began lobbying Rauner’s EPA in late 2016 to change the rules, pollution board documents show. Other documents, submitted to the board, show Illinois EPA Director Alec Messina and his staff were in contact with Dynegy last year to draft the rule change.
In Illinois, Dynegy argued the rule changes are needed to keep it competitive with energy rivals. Prior to joining Rauner’s cabinet, Messina was a registered lobbyist for a trade group that includes Dynegy as a member.
Messina’s former employer is the Illinois Environmental Regulatory Group. Its members include oil and chemical companies, energy producers and manufacturers.
* Related…
* Instead of removing toxic waste seeping into Illinois’ only scenic river, power company wants to wall it off with rocks: Located a few miles downstream from a popular kayak and canoe launch, Vistra’s three coal ash pits were dug into the floodplain by Illinois Power, which built a coal-fired power plant next to the river in 1955 and sold it in 2000 to Dynegy, another Texas-based company. By the time Dynegy shuttered the Vermilion Power Station in 2011, the pits swelled with enough water-soaked coal ash to fill the Empire State Building nearly 2½ times. Dynegy knew more than a decade ago that heavy metals found in coal ash were polluting the river, according to internal company documents. So did the Illinois Environmental Protection Agency, but the state did little in response other than file a 2012 complaint that remains unresolved.
Karen Feldman is a Republican, a mom and a real estate agent from Lincolnshire running for the state House. More than two dozen, separate mailers funded by the Democratic Party of Illinois portray her as an extremist who would criminalize abortion and give assault weapons to school children. She carries the outlandish mailers in a folder bound by an overworked rubber band.
Of course, the characterizations are inaccurate. But with the money spigot flowing from billionaire Democratic gubernatorial nominee J.B. Pritzker, and not enough nonpartisan fact-checkers, attack ads from House Speaker Michael Madigan’s party are more plentiful and vicious this cycle. The party is emboldened. It shows. […]
Feldman, who served on the Lincolnshire Village Board and faces a well-funded Democrat, is at the mercy of voters who don’t often delineate between national and state politics. On Nov. 6, Election Day, here’s hoping they will. Or at least throw those anti-Karen-Feldman mailers in the trash.
Feldman says she supports abortion rights. She supports common-sense gun legislation. She describes herself as a mainstream fiscal conservative. But with an “R” next to her name, she is constantly fending off questions about President Trump. It appears just about every Republican this election cycle is in the same boat.
* Yeah, well, things are often distorted in campaigns. Check out what Feldman and the Republicans are doing to her Democratic opponent Dan Didech in the mail…
“Like Madigan, Dan Didech has fostered a culture of workplace harassment,” according to the political mailing. “Dan Didech took a page out of the Madigan playbook and didn’t act to protect women in the workplace.”
The reference is to two female employees in the assessor’s office who came to Didech last year with complaints. He charges Feldman with mischaracterizing his actions “to score cheap political points” and says everyone deserves an environment free from sexual harassment and discrimination.
Didech said he acted on the complaints, adopted a comprehensive sexual harassment policy in October 2017 and fired two employees.
“Karen Feldman’s use of these women’s story is not only wrong but sets an incredibly dangerous and reckless precedent of using their story for political gain, and she owes the victims an apology,” Didech said in a news release.
The women issued a public statement defending Didech. The ad, they said, diminishes the importance of stories like theirs and “also makes it harder for victims of harassment to come forward, an incredibly difficult choice that too many women already struggle with.”
* Didech’s full statement…
“Every single person, male or female, deserves to work in a respectful environment, free from sexual harassment and discrimination. I believe this is an issue where we must all stand together on behalf of those who have come forward to say ‘me too,’ and those many more still unable to speak up. Sadly, in an attempt to score cheap political points in her recent mailer, Karen Feldman is unfortunately siding with perpetrators and enablers of harassment by blatantly mischaracterizing the actions I have taken on behalf of the employees and the taxpayers of Vernon Township. The women who were the targets of harassment and bullying have been first in my mind throughout every step of this process and their wishes have come first. They have bravely come forward to speak out, and have supported the actions I have directed in response. I will not ever apologize for standing with them to fight for a workplace free of harassment and discrimination.
No one deserves the kind of treatment that these women were subjected to in the assessor’s office. Sexual harassment, bullying, and discrimination have no place in the workplace, in our government, in our schools or anywhere in our society. Karen Feldman’s use of these women’s story is not only wrong but sets an incredibly dangerous and reckless precedent of using their story for political gain, and she owes the victims an apology. The victims have made the decision to come forward and issue a public letter sharing their story and how we worked together to end workplace bullying at Vernon Township. Their story is why my office adopted a comprehensive sexual harassment policy in October of 2017 that we will continue to revisit and revise as needed to ensure the safety and protection of every single township employee.
These brave women came forward over a year ago because they trusted me to listen to their story and take action to end harassment in their workplace. That’s exactly what I did. Now, Karen Feldman is forcing them to come forward again by lying about their story in a desperate attempt to win an election. This campaign stunt has no place in our community, and Karen Feldman should immediately and publicly apologize to these women. Until they receive an apology, I will not be dignifying her campaign by participating in any public events with Karen Feldman.
Today, the Illinois Republican Congressional Delegation sent the following letter to the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of Illinois. The letter calls for a full investigation into JB Pritzker’s “scheme to defraud” Illinois taxpayers by ripping toilets out of his mansion to claim the property as uninhabitable.
See the letter signed by all seven members of Illinois’ Republican Congressional delegation below:
October 3, 2018
The Honorable John R. Lausch, Jr.
United States Attorney’s Office
Northern District of Illinois, Eastern Division
219 S. Dearborn St., 5th Floor
Chicago, IL 60604
Mr. Lausch:
We write to call your attention to a recent Cook County Inspector General investigation which concluded that Jay Robert (J.B.) Pritzker engaged in a “scheme to defraud” Cook County of over $300,000 in improper property tax reductions and refunds.
As reported by the Chicago Sun-Times, the Cook County Assessor’s Office in 2015 reduced the assessed valuation of a mansion owned by Mr. Pritzker from $6.25 million to just under $1.1 million. These reductions allowed Mr. Pritzker to claim $132,747.18 in refunds for property taxes paid in 2012, 2013 and 2014, and reduced his property taxes for 2015 and 2016 by $198,684.85.
The Inspector General’s report concluded that the assessment reductions were reduced due to fraudulent affidavits submitted by Tom Muenster, Mr. Pritzker’s brother-in-law, and Christine Lovely, Mary Kathryn (M.K.) Pritzker’s assistant. These affidavits falsely claimed that the mansion had been “vacant and uninhabitable,” with no working toilets, since January 1, 2012. The Inspector General report found that, contrary to the affidavits, the toilets had been removed on October 6, 2015, just ten days before a scheduled appraisal of the property, at the direction of M.K. Pritzker. According to an email obtained by the Inspector General, Ms. Pritzker directed that the toilets be removed for the express purpose of allowing the house to be declared uninhabitable.
The facts described in the Inspector General’s report appear to constitute fraud and perjury. Since the improperly-obtained refund checks were sent to Mr. Pritzker through the U.S. Mail, a violation of 18 USC 1341 (the Federal Mail Fraud Statute) may have occurred.
Illinois, perhaps more than any other state, has suffered greatly due to public corruption. Four of Illinois’ last nine governors have gone to prison. It is important to send a strong signal to the people of Illinois that no one is above the law, not even billionaires running for Governor. For that reason, we urge you to fully investigate this matter with all due speed.
Sincerely,
U.S. Representative Peter Roskam (IL-6)
U.S. Representative Mike Bost (IL-12)
U.S. Representative Rodney Davis (IL-13)
U.S. Representative Randy Hultgren (IL-14)
U.S. Representative John Shimkus (IL-15)
U.S. Representative Adam Kinzinger (IL-16)
U.S. Representative Darin LaHood (IL-18)
State Sen. Sam McCann, running for governor under the Conservative Party banner, has taken to the airwaves with a commercial.
McCann, of Plainview, is seen driving a pickup truck on a two-lane highway and through an unpaved path through a farm field, as well as greeting voters.
“People are tired of being used,” McCann says in the ad, “tired of being promised by the Rauners and the Pritzkers that change is coming. […]
McCann said his campaign is spending about $275,000 for “a robust buy on downstate network and Chicagoland cable” stations.
$275K would be a “robust buy” in a state House race. It’s a tiny buy statewide. Not to mention that a pro-Rauner group just launched a $1.5 million TV ad campaign slamming McCann.
* Anyway, I think I posted this ad here when it was still a YouTube video…
Newly disclosed records from the office of Illinois Gov. Bruce Rauner document a pattern by the state of slow-walking and soft-pedaling bad news about deadly outbreaks of Legionnaires’ disease at a state-run home for war veterans in downstate Quincy.
That pattern began with Rauner’s office early on putting a kibosh on informing the public about a 2015 Legionnaires’ disease outbreak that killed a dozen residents at the veterans’ home, state records show.
July 24: Earliest known case of Legionnaires’ disease at the Illinois Veterans’ Home in Quincy, according to a report issued later by the Centers for Disease Control (CDC).
August 21: Illinois Department of Veterans Affairs Director Erica Jeffries later claims that on this date, her department “shut down the water, we removed aerators from all the showers, we shut down our fountains, we started issuing bottled water” because of the outbreak.
August 21: Illinois Veterans’ Home resident Melvin Tucker develops a fever. He is given Tylenol.
August 23: Illinois Department of Public Health notifies CDC of “five laboratory-confirmed cases of Legionnaires’ disease among residents and staff.”
August 24: Adams County Health Department Director of Clinical and Environmental Services Shay Drummond claims this is the date when “environmental control and mediation” actually starts
August 24: In an email, a state Veterans’ Affairs spokesman alerted the governor’s press staff about the Legionnaires’ test results, saying, “We have a situation at the Quincy home.” The spokesman went on to say he did not intend to publicize details of the test results that day unless “directed or in the case of wide media interest.”
August 25: Rauner does Springfield media event with Veterans’ Affairs Director Erica Jeffries at Springfield airport.
Aug. 25: Rauner’s press secretary at the time, Lindsay Walters, directed press aides in the Illinois Department of Veterans’ Affairs and Illinois Department of Public Health not to issue a public statement about the growing Legionnaires’ threat at the home, documents show. “I do not think we need to issue a statement to the media. Let’s hold and see if we receive any reporter inquiries,” she said.
Aug. 26: There are now 28 Legionnaires’ disease onsets, the CDC reports later.
August 26: Three days after CDC was first notified of the Legionnaires’ disease outbreak, and 2-4 days after remediation efforts began, Gerald Kuhn, 90, is given Tylenol for a fever that reaches 104 degrees. Kuhn asks to go to the hospital and tests positive there for Legionella.
August 26: Last day Dolores French is seen alive. Her military veteran husband lives in another section of the complex.
August 27: “The Illinois Department of Veterans’ Affairs (IDVA) and the Illinois Department of Public Health (IDPH) today announced eight confirmed cases of Legionnaires’ disease in residents at the Illinois Veterans’ Home - Quincy. There have been no known deaths related to this outbreak.”
August 27: After six days with a fever, Melvin Tucker is still not on any kind of antibiotic and hasn’t yet been tested for Legionnaires’, despite the CDC being notified four days earlier of an outbreak and the state announcing eight confirmed cases that same day.
August 28: “Two residents of an Illinois veterans home have died of Legionnaires’ disease, the Illinois Department of Public Health said Friday…. [both] had underlying medical conditions. Both were among 23 residents of the facility who had earlier been diagnosed with the disease.”
August 29: Dolores French is found dead and her body was decomposed. Her only underlying medical condition was deafness.
* OK, let’s get to more new stuff. Fast-forward to 2016, when the veterans home was hit yet again with another outbreak of five Legionnaires’ cases…
Spring/Summer: Between April and June 2016, testing within the home’s water system found the bacteria that causes Legionnaires’ between 42 percent and 90 percent of the time, state records show.
September: [Quincy home administrator Troy Culbertson] said no one is hiding information. He explained that we have a big responsibility. What we say and how we say it is very important. There is a responsibility to public safety, to economic development in the Quincy area and tourism.
Cases emerged in March, May and September of [2017], but there was no public acknowledgement of those cases by the state until WBEZ pressed the question last December.
* And then in October of 2017 the home was hit by two more cases, and one was fatal…
No written press release was issued about the two October cases, though a draft press release circulated to the Adams County Health Department alluded to the undisclosed cases earlier in the year, records show. That release never was made public.
Instead, the state initially called media outlets only in Quincy to report just the two October cases. That outreach didn’t happen until about four days after the second positive case that month, records show.
*** UPDATE *** The Pritzker campaign responded last night and I just saw it now…
“We’ve long known that Bruce Rauner fatally mismanaged the Quincy Veterans’ Home, but now we’re presented with the shameful truth that the governor’s office was directly involved in the cover-up that cost Veterans their lives,” said JB Pritzker. “Instead of informing Veterans, their families, and the dedicated staff providing critical care, Rauner’s office kept quiet and hoped no one would ask questions about the deadly bacteria. Lives were at stake, but this failed governor was more worried about bad press coverage than keeping our nation’s heroes healthy and safe. This unconscionable negligence cannot be tolerated, especially at the highest levels of government. Bruce Rauner failed our Veterans, and he must be held accountable.”
