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* UPDATED x2 * Republicans blast Pritzker for trying to lift Shakman decree

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* Press release…

In a recent court filing, Governor Pritzker is seeking to vacate a set of court decrees that seek to prevent politically motivated hiring, as well as politically motivated firings or other punishments against public employees known as the Shakman decrees. Against the backdrop of one of the largest patronage scandals in the history of the state involving House Speaker Michael Madigan and ComEd, State Representatives Tim Butler (R-Springfield), Deanne Mazzochi (R-Elmhurst) and Grant Wehrli (R-Naperville) held a press conference questioning Pritzker’s move.

“This year we’ve seen federal authorities indict and secure guilty pleas from Democratic members of the General Assembly for bribery and fraud,” said Rep. Mazzochi. “ComEd admitted to multiple pay-to-play schemes to bribe the most powerful politician in the state, Mike Madigan, and his cabal of loyal minions. I caught Pritzker’s administration using state funds to hire his campaign worker through a no-bid vendor contract. And now Pritzker demands that the courts get rid of prohibitions designed to stop government employee political machines? Now is not the time to make corrupt government easier.”

The Shakman decrees consist of three federal court orders issued as a result of a class-action lawsuit filed by Michael Shakman against the Democratic Organization of Cook County. The decrees, issued in 1972, 1979 and 1983, prohibit politically motivated firings, demotions, transfers or other punishments of government employees. It is also unlawful to take any political factor into account when hiring public employees, except for positions such as policymaking. These decrees are binding on more than 40 offices statewide, including the Governor’s office.

“While Speaker Madigan is embroiled in one of the worst patronage hiring schemes in the history of our state, why is Gov. Pritzker trying to remove a system that prevents patronage hiring and firing in government? It makes no sense,” said Rep. Butler. “We should be taking steps to strengthen the law against patronage. If the Governor would stop trying to go it alone and work with the General Assembly, we could be doing that right now.”

Despite the Governor’s push to vacate the decrees, the court-appointed monitor for the state’s hiring practices, Noelle Brennan, reported earlier this year that Pritzker’s administration still has not completed a comprehensive employment plan to address the issues protected by the decrees. In fact, she said the administration began restricting communication between her staff and state agencies.

“This is a step in the wrong direction taking place at the wrong time,” said Rep. Wehrli. “We are continually hearing of new instances where people in high positions of public trust are abusing that trust and providing their friends with jobs. If Governor Pritzker is truly interested in raising the ethical bar for public officials in Illinois, rather than trying to vacate the decree he should be seeking to expand it.”

During the press conference, the representatives noted that this latest revelation gives even more credence to Republican calls for a special session to address the state’s ethics laws and the scandal surrounding Speaker Madigan and ComEd.

Um, what does the Shakman decree have to do with a private company’s hiring?

I mean, this move by the governor doesn’t sit 100 percent well with me, but that’s kind of a stretch.

Then again, voters don’t do nuance.

* This is from the governor’s filing…

First, the State has reformed its employment practices to unquestionably pass constitutional muster. The State has instituted a durable solution to prevent future patronage employment practices. It has a comprehensive “exempt list” – approved by the Plaintiffs, the Special Master, and the Court – which the Court identified as the central infirmity of the State’s prior employment practices when Plaintiffs sought supplemental relief in 2014 and 2016. addition, the State, by statute, has instituted an independent oversight structure in the Office of Executive Inspector General, which has within it a dedicated Hiring and Employment Monitoring Division – comprised of ten professionals with expertise and experience in monitoring the State’s employment practices to prevent and uncover political and other forms of discrimination, misconduct, and inefficiency.

In addition, the Special Master exhaustively has monitored the State’s employment policies and practices for the past six years, and has filed 350 pages of detailed reports describing her work and her findings. Those reports acknowledge the State’s “significant progress,” e.g., Dkt. 6565 at 1, and do not identify a single patronage violation during that timeframe – let alone the kind of widespread illegal policies or practices to justify continued systemic intervention.

Second, during the protracted life of the decree, this case has become unmoored from the Constitution. Article III confines courts to cases and controversies involving individual federal rights. To ensure the presence of a case and controversy, Article III requires, as an irreducible constitutional minimum, an injury that is fairly traceable to the defendant’s allegedly unlawful conduct, and that is likely to be redressed by the requested relief. E.g., Lujan v. Defenders of Wildlife, 504 U.S. 555, 560-61 (1992). Plaintiffs are two private lawyers who, regardless of how they came to be litigants in 1969, now in no respects satisfy this constitutional minimum. They simply are not affected, let alone injured, by the State’s employment policies – they are not State employees and have no desire to become State employees.

*** UPDATE 1 *** Jordan Abudayyeh at the governor’s office…

During six years of oversight by the Special Master, the State has not been subject to even one finding of a violation of the consent decree. Additionally, the State has instituted effective safeguards to ensure ongoing compliance. The case should not continue to be litigated just because these legislators do not understand the basic facts. It’s clear the House GOP never bothered to read the court filing that they are criticizing or learn anything about the Shakman case. When it comes to the State, the Shakman case is not “a set of court decrees that seek to prevent politically motivated hiring” as the GOP erroneously claims. The State is a party to only the 1972 decree, which does not apply at all to State hiring or private hiring. The State moved to vacate because it has achieved the specific requirements of the decree and taken the steps required by the Court.

Background…

Even if there was a shred of truth to any one of the allegations in the House GOP release, what they are claiming has absolutely nothing to do with the Shakman case. It is nonsense to try to link these allegations to the Shakman case.

Political hiring is governed by the Rutan case, which is separate from the 1972 Shakman consent decree. The State, like all governments, must continue to comply fully with the requirements of Rutan.

As one of many clear examples of how little the House GOP members understand this case, the State is not, and has never been, subject to 1979 and 1983 decrees.

*** UPDATE 2 *** Eleni Demertzis with the House Republicans…

While Shakman and Rutan are two separate cases, they are intertwined in that both cases involve political influence in employment decisions. One involved seeking donations for keeping their jobs or avoiding disciplinary while the other dealt with hiring and firings due to political affiliation. In both instances, politics come into play when deciding what course of action to take. To remove one protection against political influence in state employment decisions at a time when a state-regulated company admitted in an official federal court document to hiring associates of an extremely high level legislative official in return for legislative action that has an estimated value of at least $150 million, is extremely short-sighted and ignores the unethical actions of Democratic state officials. It is naïve to think that just because ComEd was a private entity hiring associates of a state official, that it does not or would not happen with a governmental entity. If the Governor wants to call for the special session on ethics that we have been calling for, we can work together in a bipartisan nature to clean up the state and restore faith in our government. Otherwise, removing a protection from political influence in state employment decision-making will just further re-enforce to our constituents that it’s business as usual in spite of all the federal indictments.

posted by Rich Miller
Monday, Aug 17, 20 @ 11:21 am

Comments

“First, the State has reformed its employment practices to unquestionably pass constitutional muster. The State has instituted a durable solution to prevent future patronage employment practices. ”

Um the oversight is by the Governors appointed OIG. So for example if the Gov office interferes in a hiring decision, then its appointed person determines if it was wrong…. I would not call that reform.

Salary decisions requiring approval by appointees of the Gov office at CMS…. not reform….

Hiring having to be approved by Gov appointees at CMS, not reform.

Comment by Ghost Monday, Aug 17, 20 @ 11:28 am
See GOP embracing Blago post. The GOP hypocrisy would be laughable if it hadn’t led to the sick Trumpism we now find ourselves.

Comment by Norseman Monday, Aug 17, 20 @ 11:35 am
Ghost: the current OIG was nominated by Bruce Rauner.

Comment by Socially DIstant watcher Monday, Aug 17, 20 @ 11:45 am
–So for example if –

Stop right there. That’s not how any of this works. You must have standing in a court of law to seek a remedy. Unless you can point to a specific instance of wrongdoing by the process and the harm that inflicted upon someone, your hypothetical is irrelevant to the law.

The Pritzker administration is arguing just that. No one any longer has standing from those decisions in any shape or form. So unless you have people ready to come forward and say they’ve been harmed by the Rauner appointed OIG under the Pritzker administration, then your point is irrelevant.

Comment by MG85 Monday, Aug 17, 20 @ 12:00 pm
The Shakman shananigans from Rauner were a joke. In Rauners first two years he tried to make every position exempt (because philosophically he doesn’t believe in employee protections), at year 3 when Rauner fired his staff and it was clear to everyone he would lose no matter who the D’s nominated, he voluntarily expanded shakman review and converted every exempt position to non exempt to hamper the democrats efforts to govern.

Now we’re in a global pandemic and because of
Shakman it take sometimes 2-3 years to fill one position. the whole thing is a joke and the only one who wins is the special master who bills millions

Comment by Merica Monday, Aug 17, 20 @ 12:03 pm
Shakman is also less relevant because of the States hiring needs. The State needs to hire 5,000-8,000 people. many of those positions are in Springfield. JB has to hire a bunch of republicans to get his government staffed and operational.

Comment by Merica Monday, Aug 17, 20 @ 12:06 pm
Butler must be upset that they have slowed down the hiring of his people. I sad slowed down not stopped.

Comment by Red ghetto in a blue state Monday, Aug 17, 20 @ 12:14 pm
I thought republicans would be ok with this. When I moved to central IL from the south back in the early 90’s, you couldn’t get a state job without being affiliated with the republican party in some way. The “hiring freeze”, all applications being routed to the govs office, employees buying fundraising tickets in order to get interviews for friends and family - Shakman was a joke to them. Now all of a sudden Shakman is so important? 🤔

Comment by Lester Holt’s Mustache Monday, Aug 17, 20 @ 12:21 pm
Special Master or not the other Agencies can just take lessons from the Rauner holdovers at IDOT on how to get around the Special Master.

Comment by IDOTTIE Monday, Aug 17, 20 @ 12:36 pm
The City of Chicago and parts of Cook County government have managed to get dismissed from the decree, no reason why the State of Illinois can’t join them.

The second part of the Pritzker filing is spot on, standing doctrine in federal courts is different now than when Shakman first filed suit, the plaintiffs simply don’t have a harm that impacts them to point to.

Comment by Derek Smalls Monday, Aug 17, 20 @ 12:54 pm
Lester Holt’s Mustache - Thank you.

Between the Shakman issue and former Gov. Thompson’s passing, my mind is swimming of patronage memories, including former CMS Michael Tristano trying to make the CMS revolving funds exempt from budgetary restrictions, so, in part, then Sangamon County GOP Chairman Irv Smith could use it as a patronage hiring hall. How the worm has turned.

Comment by Anyone Remember Monday, Aug 17, 20 @ 12:57 pm
The republican’ts are upset because they can’t pad state employment positions with their cronies.

Comment by Huh? Monday, Aug 17, 20 @ 12:58 pm
Way past time for it to go. Is a patronage job in and off itself
I too remember patronage hiring. To the victor belong the spoils. Get out and work harder Republicans or maybe get some candidates from this century and when a few spots then you can hate Shakeman again.

Comment by DuPage Saint Monday, Aug 17, 20 @ 1:17 pm
ShaHackman is all about the money. He supports Nepotism and has his son on the payroll raking in the taxpayers money. He was the guy who was crying over the private jet tax. Time for them to stop leaching off the taxpayers.

Comment by Frumpy White Guy Monday, Aug 17, 20 @ 1:35 pm
Surprised it took them this long. I mean there’s no there there, but it’s a real statement of their failure politically not to have made hay about this when the Administration made this filing almost three weeks ago.

Comment by Southern Skeptic Monday, Aug 17, 20 @ 1:48 pm
Shakman and Rutan have outlived their usefulness and probably would not be upheld if reviewed by the current US Supreme Court. Hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars have been wasted on hyper-human resource officers. Shakman and his people have gotten rich and the government’s ability to function has been lessened.

Comment by southsider Monday, Aug 17, 20 @ 1:54 pm
State hiring was an abysmal process that discouraged involvement and left key jobs vacant long before the Special Master was around. Why are the Republicans making such a point out of something they struggled with on an hourly basis during their most recent four year run? Republicans must feel so resigned to super-minority status to feel they can make punches that would otherwise come back and sock them in the nose.

Stop hitting yourself. Your constituents need people who make the trains run on time, too.

Comment by Bertrum Cates Monday, Aug 17, 20 @ 1:55 pm
Merica’s rant is not so accurate. The Civil Service Commission makes exempt/non-exempt determinations, not the administration. It’s not a rubber stamp. It has had its issues with CMS, OIG and the Special Master along the way but appears to be slowly being run off its statutory responsibility in that regard. It is odd that there does not appear to be any reference to its role in JB’s filing. Apparently the administration is content with the OIG expanding its turf well beyond its statutory base. It can be quite the cozy relationship between CMS and the Hiring and Employment Monitor.

Comment by Original Rambler Monday, Aug 17, 20 @ 2:14 pm
Way inside baseball.

Comment by walker Monday, Aug 17, 20 @ 2:39 pm
The Shakman father and son taxpayer funded business enterprise has got to end. The Shankmans are not interested in compliance because they have a huge reliance on the public budgets to fuel their multi million dollar appetites.

Comment by Ostomie Wedgie Monday, Aug 17, 20 @ 2:41 pm
IDOT’s Raunerite former Chief of Staff created an exempt position for one of his ‘girls’ last year right under the Special Master’s nose. The Special Master is making a mint off the State. It’s about time someone puts an end to this. It’s a joke.

Comment by IDOT Employee Monday, Aug 17, 20 @ 2:48 pm
How many tax dollars go into keeping the process going every year?

Comment by Jake Jacobs Monday, Aug 17, 20 @ 3:04 pm
The timing and thoughts to ending Shackman is horrible considering all that is swirling around, but that really it, the timing and thoughts.

Voters don’t do nuance. That’s the real challenge, frankly, is trying to deal with the non-nuanced “political hires” thinking others will push as the governor trying to bring back older thinking without oversight.

Comment by Oswego Willy Monday, Aug 17, 20 @ 3:40 pm
I’d love to know who is on the “exempt list” and how Joe Berrios was able to have multiple family members on staff.

Comment by the working poor Monday, Aug 17, 20 @ 5:24 pm