Former Illinois Governor Pat Quinn recently held a press conference at the State Capitol to push for property tax relief. And he’s right about one thing: Illinois property taxes are crushing families. According to the Illinois Policy Institute, our state has the second highest property tax in the nation. And yes, we agree that relief is needed.

But instead of addressing the root problem—out-of-control government spending—Quinn is proposing yet another tax.… Continue Reading

In 2010 State Senator Bill Brady (R-Bloomington) lost the gubernatorial race to Pat Quinn by 31,834 votes–less than one percentage point. Brady took a pounding from the pro-abortion Personal PAC’s television ads starting in early August.

Unlike Bill Clinton in his 1992 contest against George Bush, Brady never responded when he was attacked. On the abortion issue, he stood there like a punching bag and took the blows.… Continue Reading

The Chicago Tribune writes that “The (Paul Simon Institute) survey found Bruce Rauner, the first-term governor, leading his Republican challenger, three-term state Rep. Jeanne Ives of Wheaton, 51 percent to 31 percent, with 18 percent undecided or favoring someone else.”

Before Ives’ supporters allow defeatism to creep in, here’s a word on polling from the American Association of Public Opinion Research: “[E]ven the best public opinion poll is only a snapshot of public opinion at the particular moment in time, not an eternal truth.”… Continue Reading

There are more Democratic Party candidates for attorney general (8) than there are for governor (6). Speaker Michael Madigan’s daughter, Lisa Madigan, retiring after the end of her fourth term, has held the office since first being elected in 2002.

The candidates are State Rep. Scott Drury, Sharon Fairley, Aaron Goldstein, Renato Mariotti, State Sen. Kwame Raoul, Nancy Rotering, Jesse Ruiz, and former governor Pat Quinn.… Continue Reading

Gov. Bruce Rauner (R) of Illinois believes that his state is on the verge of “banana republic territory” because the state faces an imminent financial crisis. As described in a story published by The Fiscal Times on June 12:

Last week, the state marked the second full year in which Gov. Bruce Rauner and a combative Democratic legislature were unable to agree on a new operating budget. The state Senate the week before rejected a House-passed budget measure premised on a $7 billion revenue shortfall after Rauner threatened to veto it.

Illinois politicians are notorious for making deals in the middle of a crisis that end up being good for the political establishment but destructive for Illinois residents and taxpayers. It’s no coincidence that the author of the famous quote “You never want a serious crisis to go to waste” – Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel – hails from Illinois.

Now Illinois is in the midst of its worst fiscal crisis ever, and yet another bad deal is on the horizon.… Continue Reading

Written by Sara Burnett
Associated Press

The state where both Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton used to live is still reliably Democratic when it comes to picking a president.

But drill a little deeper and it’s clear the political map changed, with more counties flipping from Democrat to Republican just as they did in states like Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, helping Donald Trump become president.

While Trump won a smaller percentage of the state’s overall vote than Mitt Romney did in 2012 due to dismal support in Chicago and its suburbs, he won a dozen more counties than Romney.… Continue Reading

Written by John Biver

Former Governor Pat Quinn, a fixture on the Illinois political scene for decades, has been on the statewide ballot many times, and also served as State Treasurer and Lt. Governor. Earlier this month, Reboot Illinois’ Matt Dietrich wrote this:

Before serving as governor from 2009 to 2015, Pat Quinn was known as a rabble-rousing reformer who, most famously, led a 1980 citizen initiative that cut the membership of the Illinois House by one-third.

Written by John Biver

Former governor Pat Quinn agrees with Bruce Rauner, the guy who made him a former governor, when it comes to term limits. While Rauner continues to press for term limits for state legislative and statewide offices, Quinn has launched an effort aimed at the City of Chicago’s mayor. More on those proposals later. First, a few comments on the issue itself.

Limiting the years a person can serve in important political offices isn’t new.… Continue Reading

Four years ago, State Rep. Tom Morrison (R-Palatine) walked into a state office and announced he didn’t want a pension.

“I got a blank look in response. The General Assembly has an incredibly generous pension plan, and I was told I was the first legislator to choose not to participate in more than 14 years. I guess I was a trend-setter because today one-fifth of the General Assembly doesn’t participate,” the Palatine Republican said.… Continue Reading

Written by Russ Stewart

Remember that old verity, you get what you pay for? Often, you don’t. In Illinois politics, however, you pay for what you get, and the candidate who pays the most is the candidate who gets.

Bruce Rauner is Illinois’ governor because during 2014 he raised $78,191,560 and spent $58,426,802. Roughly $25 million of his receipts came from his own pocket. Self-funding, in essence, bought him the governorship.

Rauner beat Pat Quinn 1,823,627 to 1,681,343, getting 50.3 percent of the vote and winning by a margin of a margin of 142,284 votes.… Continue Reading

Written by Russ Stewart

Death can be extraordinarily beneficial to an ambitious politician. Death creates openings, and openings are opportunities.

The death of Illinois Comptroller Judy Baar Topinka creates a tantalizing opening. The question in political circles is, who gets her job, a caretaker or a keeper?

Having been re-elected to her second term on Nov. 4, Topinka’s death on Dec. 10 creates two thorny legal issues — who appoints her successor, and for what duration?… Continue Reading

Written by Russ Stewart

The outcome of Illinois’ gubernatorial race proves anew that any mother’s son can grow up to be governor, provided that he can self-fund $28 million and raise another $60 million.

Republican Bruce Rauner‘s win also reaffirms another pearl of wisdom: Bad always gets worse. If Illinoisans thought that state government was incompetent and leadership was dysfunctional under the Quinn-Madigan-Cullerton Democratic regime, they ain’t seen nothing yet.

The 2018 campaign for governor started on Nov.… Continue Reading

Written by Russ Stewart

Michael Madigan is a political genius, a durable Democratic leader, a successful and wealthy lawyer, and a horrendously dysfunctional speaker of the Illinois House.

Mayor Richard J. Daley once babbled some nonsense that “Good government is good politics.” He should have known better, as he spent a decade in Springfield, where the operative philosophy is “good politics may be good government, but if it’s not, so what?” Grasping, clutching and holding power is endemic.… Continue Reading

Written by Russ Stewart

The Nov. 4 election, for Democratic politicians in Chicago, will be a “UPS moment.” Which committeemen among the 50 Chicago wards will deliver, and will their delivery be decisive and intimidating?

With Chicago politicians already heavily focused on the Feb. 24, 2015, municipal election, and those with statewide ambitions intensely pondering the state landscape for 2016 and 2018, the 2014 vote will, to use that old expression, “separate the men from the boys.”… Continue Reading

Written by Benjamin BanMetre

Illinois began August with a $4.4 billion dollar backlog of unpaid bills. If lawmakers would have kept the promises they made in 2011, the backlog would be zero today – or close to it.

In January 2011, Illinois lawmakers pushed through a record tax hike that raised the income tax rate on individuals to 5 percent from 3 percent, and on corporations to 7 percent from 4.8 percent. They called it the Taxpayer Accountability and Budget Stabilization Act and went on record making the following promises:

“We have some temporary tax increases that are designed to pay our bills, get Illinois back on fiscal sound footing and make sure that our state has a strong economy.”

Written by IllinoisReview.com

Written by Russ Stewart

Illinois is an anomaly. It is “The Land of Lassitude.” Voters are passive, partisan and forgiving. In state government, there are no checks and balances to Democratic abuses, ineptitude and favoritism.

In any other state, when a governor is impeached, indicted, convicted and imprisoned, the party of that incumbent would be shamed, tarnished and ousted. Not in Illinois.

In any other state, when one party controls all the levers of government — governor, both houses of the state legislature and the supreme court — and that party fails to govern effectively, voters would hold them accountable and they would be ousted.… Continue Reading

Written by IllinoisReview.com

Illinois taxpayers should be upset about the millions of taxpayer dollars that Governor Pat Quinn distributed to anti-violence groups in the Chicago, Rockford and Metro-East areas during the months leading up to his 2010 election, a state lawmaker said Thursday.

Earlier this week, the Legislative Audit Commission announced it would be reviewing Quinn’s Neighborhood Recovery Initiative.

Would this panel overlooking Quinn’s program be hinting of a pre-impeachment investigation?

“No, no,” insisted Commission member State Representative David Reis (R-Ste.… Continue Reading

Written by Dan Proft, IllinoisOpportunity.org

This week two Chicago Democrat politicians who are farther out over their skis than Eddie “The Eagle” Edwards ever was (I’ve got Winter Olympics fever) will tell us their version of the state of United States of America, and the state of the State of Illinois.

They will explain to us that with just a few structural tax increases, and a price control or two, we could be living in a modern Utopia not even H.G.… Continue Reading