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A little-noticed bill awaiting action from Illinois Governor J.B. Pritzker could become one of the most consequential employment discrimination laws of 2026.
Illinois based Liberty Justice Center lost donors because it successfully challenged the president’s global tariffs.
First announced in 2024, Gov. JB Pritzker has made the quantum computing campus one of his administration’s signature economic initiatives, investing $500 million in the park. In April, IBM announced it would create 750 full-time jobs at the campus by 2030 in exchange for an estimated $19 million in state income tax credits.
The First Amendment strictly prohibits taxes that single out content the state doesn’t like. Unfortunately, that’s exactly what Illinois’ new state spending plan does, and it’s poised to soon be signed by Governor Pritzker.
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"Why leave? Power - in Illinois, to be far from Chicago is to be far from power. Democrats, many from the state's one big city, hold a supermajority in the legislature, much to the dismay of downstate conservatives. So (Loret) Newlin's task is to get a nonbinding question on the ballot asking, should we explore leaving Cook County to start a new state?"
The high-tech specs that have grown in popularity allow users to watch and record videos, send messages and scroll through plenty of the other minutiae that too many drivers are already distracting themselves with on their cellphones, according to Illinois Secretary of State Alexi Giannoulias.
Attorney General Kwame Raoul led a coalition of 22 attorneys general in defending a district court’s dismissal of the Trump administration’s lawsuit challenging the Protect Our Courts Act (POCA), a New York law that prohibits civil arrests in state courthouses unless backed by a judicial order, as well as two executive orders that promote public safety in state government buildings.
According to a 2023 survey of human services government contractors by the Health and Human Services Coalition of Illinois, a group of Illinois human services providers, at least 25 percent of state contracts were not paid on a timely, ongoing basis. The issue was especially prevalent for nonprofit contractors with small budgets and those serving or led by people of color, the survey found.
Under the tax, companies with more than $1 million in gross receipts from digital advertising services provided in Illinois would be charged 10 percent on those receipts. Lawmakers say the move could bring in $200 million to $800 million a year. Opponents say the measure violates the federal Internet Tax Freedom Act and Illinois’ Uniformity Clause and that if upheld would be difficult or impossible to administer.
State lawmakers adjourned for the summer without advancing a bill to merge the Illinois Gaming Board with the state Racing Board under a streamlined Department of Gaming Regulation and Enforcement — one that’s not subject to open meetings that are accessible to the public and press.
Jim Dey: "The Ammons is Titianna, daughter of state Rep. Carol Ammons and Champaign County Clerk and Recorder Aaron Ammons. ... Following in her parents’ footsteps, Titianna was elected to the Champaign County Board in 2020, ran for but lost a contest for Urbana city clerk a year later and now is the county’s chief deputy circuit clerk. Whether the recent indictment for wrongfully collecting unemployment benefits while holding multiple jobs changes any of that remains to be seen."
"Democrats want a pat on the back for 1.3 cents per gallon in relief at the pump and a two-week sales tax holiday on school supplies. That's not tax relief. It's spare change packaged as a policy victory while they pass the largest budget in state history."
"Despite its constitutionally mandated flat rate, Illinois can still generate additional income tax revenue — and make state tax burden fairer — by increasing its rate, while simultaneously implementing a tax credit targeted to low- and middle-income earners, to offset any additional income taxes the rate increase would otherwise generate for them."
Illinois lawmakers approved a nearly $56 billion state budget last week, but one measure backed by farm groups was left out. Supporters of the Family Farm Preservation Act said it would help keep family farms in family hands by reforming estate tax policies.
Analysis from Pew Research Center finds the Midwest alone is set to see a 64 percent increase in development, and overwhelmingly, the development is planned for rural areas. About two-thirds of planned data centers in the U.S. are located in rural communities.
Under this leadership, the $18 billion state employee pension fund divested from hedge funds investments, with Levine arguing that hedge fund “returns are terrible, and the costs are enormous.”
The U.S. House of Representatives recently passed legislation sponsored by U.S. Rep. Mary Miller, R-Ill., aimed at strengthening oversight of federal childcare assistance programs and cracking down on fraud.
Despite the decision not to formally participate, Illinois may still have some presence at the fair. The state will be represented by the Peoria Riverfront Museum.
"Pritzker has been sharply criticized for quite a while for focusing more on the national political front than on governing Illinois. And while all or parts of several bills on his priority list did pass, the danger for Pritzker is that this Bears failure will overshadow everything else and highlight his national ambitions because it’s something that transcends the statehouse. His attendance record, while not a complete look at his work, does him no favors."
The law immediately bans the sale of intoxicating hemp products to people under 21. A new set of hemp regulations will kick in this November, including child-proof packaging and a ban on marketing and packaging catered to children.
"We lose 50 percent of our students already," said Sen. Jason Plummer. "It's actually slightly above 50 percent to out-of-state colleges and universities. Legislation like this will only increase that number. It will push more of our young minds to other states."
The General Assembly established the Illinois Independent Tax Tribunal in 2013 to resolve taxpayer disputes with the Illinois Department of Revenue. After Gov. JB Pritzker sought to transfer the tribunal’s responsibilities back to the Illinois Department of Revenue, the tribunal’s chief administrative judge, James Conway, turned to the Senate Appropriations Committee.
President Trump’s Executive Order No. 14398, issued March 26, directs federal agencies to adopt new contract terms prohibiting federal contractors, including state agencies and instrumentalities, from engaging in “racially discriminatory DEI activities” in connection with their contract work. Illinois and its agencies regularly contract with the federal government, and the coalition states collectively hold existing federal contracts worth billions of dollars.
Turner agrees with Gov. JB Pritzker’s pause on data center tax credits. “I see no need for the tax credits, because those companies have plenty of money, and if they are going to build a data center, they don't need any tax credits,” Turner said.
In the lawsuits pending against DuPage and the other northern and central Illinois counties, the counties have again filed a so-called third party complaint, seeking to either escape liability or force some of the larger private "tax buyers" to join in any liability and potential payout to people whose homes were unconstitutionally taken. In March, U.S. District Judge Sara Ellis rejected the counties' attempts to also force the state of Illinois to shoulder some of the blame.
David Berger, who co-founded Ivy Hall, was found guilty last year in federal court of laundering hundreds of thousands of dollars in drug proceeds by converting cocaine money into private jet flights for a trafficker. His cannabis license was terminated May 11. A separate development involving a newer Fox Lake cannabis shop raises new questions about the opaque system for licensing cannabis businesses and Berger’s continued role in the industry.
The money was established under bipartisan legislation Gov. JB Pritzker signed last July. The bill, known as the Prescription Drug Affordability Act, put new regulations on pharmacy benefit managers, or PBMs, companies that are responsible for negotiating drug prices between employer health insurance plans and pharmaceutical drug companies.
Illinois State Rep. Justin Slaughter talks a new Illinois bill that would lift the current cap and provide exonerees who obtain a Certificate of Innocence with $50,000 for every year they were wrongfully convicted. Slaughter said the awards are funded by taxpayers.
Top Chicago Stories
African American Contractors Association president Omar Shareef said that a total of seven separate subcontractors have contacted him for help with pursuing missing payments in the past several months. Some of the contractors are owed seven figures. They’re willing to settle for less, as long as they can keep their businesses running.
Anthony Riccio, who retired as the second-ranking Chicago police official, said the spike in air bag thefts likely means criminals have noticed that police aren’t doing much to combat the problem. Of the more than 1,260 theft cases opened this year, almost 60 percent had already been suspended.
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"Our community doesn’t need more monuments or political nostalgia. It suffers from a culture that too often excuses personal responsibility, rewards dependency and trades faith for false political hope. ... Our children don’t need a distant tower to admire. They need mentors teaching trades, discipline, fatherhood, education and the God-given dignity of work." 
Selling the vacant schools has proven difficult because of a lack of buyer interest and deteriorating building conditions. Some sales and projects have fallen through and the successful ones can take several years. In all, 14 empty buildings were still publicly owned in January.
The social media tax was expected to raise $31 million during all of 2026. But the city collected $16.4 million during the first four months alone from the 10 companies to which the levy has applied. At that rate, the first-year take would be $49.2 million, 58.7 percent higher than anticipated.
“If we can just work a little harder to balance the negatives, higher housing costs, and speculation, traffic and not paying enough attention to public transit, and displacement, of course, then it could all be a win-win eventually someday,” University of Chicago Professor Emily Talen said.
The delay will give the Finance Committee just five days between when it is first discussed in a public meeting and a recently-disclosed deadline.
He represented the 12th Ward on the Southwest Side of Chicago from 2003 until 2022, when he stepped down just ahead of his election as a commissioner on the Cook County Board of Review, which handles taxpayer appeals of property assessments.
"I had been reluctant to write about Rahm, who in presidential preference polling is barely registering. Illinois’ other presidential hopeful — Governor JB Pritzker — is polling at just two percent. One gets the feeling the country is tiring from Illinois expatriates running the country. Not our best export."
"...(I)t's noteworthy that at last week's County Board hearing on the issue, the Tribune reported that county officials could offer 'few clear explanations' for this year's delay. ... Apparently, this year's can't be laid at the feet of Tyler (technologies) and is due instead to delays and missteps at some or all of the various county offices responsible for managing Cook County's convoluted property tax system."
As of June, 25 office-to-residential conversions are underway in Downtown — more than the last 20 years combined, according to the city’s Department of Planning and Development. And the conversions will create more than 3,900 units of housing and will replace 4 million square feet of vacant office space.
The Chicago-based firm was founded and is led by Ron Huberman, who served as one of Mayor Richard M. Daley’s chiefs of staff. A former Chicago police officer, Huberman also led the city’s Office of Emergency Management Communications, the Chicago Transit Authority and Chicago Public Schools during the Daley administration. A city spokesperson said there are no records documenting the competitive process that led to Benchmark Analytics’ selection or any other proposals from other firms.
Ald. Byron Sigcho-Lopez called the device a “bomb,” though a police spokesperson characterized it as a “suspected firework.” Sigcho-Lopez, who is among the City Council’s most progressive members and who is running for Congress as an independent Democratic Socialist, said the incident’s exact motive remains a mystery, and he has contacted a lawyer to make sure the incident is properly investigated.
"CPS projects that it will have to spend almost $800 million of operating revenue in 2027 to service its debt. In other words, as much as 8 percent of the district’s budget gets spent on repaying debt. ... Many of the possible solutions are tied to two of the reasons CPS carries so much debt in the first place — an unsustainable number of school facilities and cyclical fiscal crises."
“It’s to the point that they wished they never had done (the project).”
"The specific clause that broke the deal, according to the former mayor (Rahm Emanuel): FIFA insisted the contract include the right to demand a dome be built over the open-air Soldier Field. ... The practice of granting private parties the use of public property is called a concession. And Chicago has done a horrible job of managing those concessions."
Videos shared online show dozens of people gathered at Ford City Mall as drivers performed donuts and other stunt-driving maneuvers in the parking lot. Such events have drawn large crowds across Chicago in recent years and have frequently required police intervention due to reckless driving, property damage, and violence.
A window was shattered, but no injuries were reported.
An additional 285 bars and restaurants have applied for state licenses to offer video gambling in Chicago, records show.
Chicago is required by state law to develop a balanced budget. However, unlike New York City, there are no legal requirements to balance the operating budget on a structural basis, develop and adhere to a multi-year financial plan, or refrain from issuing debt unless it is in line with a formal financial plan.
Chicago Public Schools Superintendent Macquline King, who appeared under subpoena, could neither confirm nor deny whether the district withholds information about a child’s “gender identity” in the classroom from parents.
"The city’s substitution of massive developer subsidies for a comprehensive affordable housing approach has seen the cost to build new city-funded affordable housing surge, rising from an average of $400,000 to nearly $750,000 per unit since 2019."
The indictment alleged Suhaib Ahmad Chaudhry orchestrated a scheme to use laboratories — some of which were allegedly operated by Mahmood Sami Khan— in Illinois and Texas to submit nearly $900 million in false claims to the government from April 2021 to June 2022, prompting more than $293 million in fraudulent reimbursements.
CTU leadership and other proponents of the sustainable community schools model argue that they will uplift neighborhoods and provide students needed support services. But at the eight CPS high schools that have used the model since 2018, proficiency is lower while absenteeism and spending is higher. Those eight schools also are seeing enrollment fall as families flee them.
"If the model is fair, why did bills go haywire? The answer sits one floor down, at the Cook County Board of Review, a separate elected body that hears appeals after the assessor sets a value. The assessor proposes; the Board disposes. And the Board has been busy. The University of Chicago report found that commercial appeals there shift 3-4 percent of the tax base onto residential property every single year, effectively undoing the equity the assessor's office tries to build in."
The $16.6 billion, 2026 budget approved by a City Council majority lifted the Chicago ban on video gambling and assumed Chicago would generate $6.8 million by licensing newly legalized video gambling terminals across the city.
“Local taxing bodies like suburban school districts and municipalities are going to be waiting months for revenues they need for operations. They had to go out and take payday-style gap loans to keep the lights on and that's costing school districts over $120 million in interest,” Chicago Ald. Brendan Reilly said. Legislation requiring the county to reimburse taxing districts for interest lost and debts incurred did not advance during the General Assembly’s spring session.
Wirepoints Research and Commentary
A mess of uncertainty and litigation is sure to follow. 
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Audio and summary 
A largely unasked question is becoming glaring: Is Illinois doing all it should to use artificial intelligence to make government cost less and work better? So far, the evidence says no.
Everybody needs a side hustle these days, and mine is Ukraine, where I am now.
Audio and summary 
If this bill passes, say goodbye to local control over all Illinois parks and expect to see open drug and alcohol use, needles, no sanitation and fire hazards, but no ordinary park users.
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