Illinois State Comptroller Susana Mendoza said, in part, “The situation is reminiscent of the Rauner years, when the former Illinois Governor held the budget hostage for his social agenda that led to a budget freeze for more than two years and many providers, vendors, businesses and organizations suffered greatly as a result. These actions create widespread disruption and chaos rather than stability and predictability, putting American lives at risk.”

The facility had been shut down after an armed teenager took another juvenile hostage and was killed by police officers in the fall of 2023.

“Let’s be clear, January 20th was an inauguration, not a coronation. Congress is given the power to appropriate the funding. The executive branch cannot unilaterally disregard those appropriations passed by a separate and equal house of government. We will collectively fight this unconstitutional mandate,” Raoul said. He and attorneys general from more than 20 other states also have announced plans to file a lawsuit to prevent the White House from instituting the funding freeze.

The Urbana Police Department said Katie Abraham was one of five in a stopped car near Coler and University Avenues in Urbana. That’s when a car driven by 29-year-old Julio Cucul Bol of Guatemala hit them. Police said he fled the scene on foot. Prior to being identified as Bol, police said he gave authorities an alias and used falsified Mexican paperwork. Bol was arrested in Texas three days after the crash on a bus headed to Mexico.

“The governor has directed his senior team to assess the detrimental impacts of this unlawful action on the state’s budget and services,” Pritzker spokesman Matt Hill said. Nearly 4 million lower-income Illinoisans had their health care covered in 2023 by Medicaid, a system in which the federal government reimburses the state about half of every dollar in medical costs.

Illinois’ altered workers’ comp law doesn’t block asbestos plaintiffs and others who discover diseases allegedly caused by workplace exposures to toxic substances from suing their former employers, even if the alleged disease-causing exposure happened many decades in the past, the Illinois Supreme Court has ruled.

The vast majority of the ideas won’t make it to the desk of Gov. JB Pritzker or become law—last General Assembly, House lawmakers filed 5,929 bills and only passed 564—but the list of proposals offers some insights into the issues members of the lower chamber are concerned about as they kick off their new terms in office.

Despite the gain in raw numbers, union membership continues an overall downward trend in Illinois, which saw union membership at 20.8 percent in 1989 compared to just 13.1 percent in 2024.

While the state added 56,000 jobs during 2024, the growth rate trails behind the national average and most of the states surrounding Illinois. The Illinois growth rate was 0.92 percent while the national growth was 1.42 percent, or 2.2 million jobs. Illinois saw the highest growth rates in state government jobs, adding 15,600 jobs, an increase of 11.25 percent.

Trump border czar Tom Homan called out Gov. JB Pritzker for failing to find out the truth before turning to social media. “Governor Pritzker needs to give ICE an apology,” he continued. “What he did was just plain wrong. And by doing that, he put fear in a community that shouldn’t have to be there. Children shouldn’t have to fear ICE agents walking into an elementary school to arrest them.”

Their joint statement reads, in part, “We stand with the immigrant community in Chicago and across the country, and our offices and caseworkers are ready to help those who are improperly caught up in these raids.”