Pritzker administration pushes back against Wirepoints’ critique of latest “Disaster Declaration.” Our response. – Wirepoints

By: Ted Dabrowski and John Klingner

Wirepoints recently criticized Gov. J.B. Pritzker’s proclamation in which he declared Illinois a “disaster area” for a 32nd consecutive 30-day period. The governor can’t have it both ways, we said. He can’t claim he’s managed Covid successfully and yet, more than two years later, continue to say Illinois is a disaster. 

The Pritzker administration fired back at Wirepoints last week. The emergency rules were needed, Pritzker spokeswoman Jordan Abudayyeh claimed on Twitter, so Illinois can continue to receive extra federal relief for Medicaid, food stamps, and the pandemic. The rules add flexibility to telehealth, she added, and insurers and Medicare must continue to cover the cost of Covid tests.

Abudayyeh also took the standard swipe at red states for ending their emergencies, saying they don’t care about people.

Abudayyeh’s complete Twitter thread can be found at the end of this piece. The administration’s response is hypocritical, at best. Here’s why:

1. A vast majority of states ended their public health emergencies/disaster proclamations months ago. Pritzker’s continued renewal doesn’t just make Illinois an outlier among its immediate neighbors – every one of them have already ended their orders – it makes Illinois a national outlier as well.

As of July 26, 2022, just 14 states in the country still had some form of emergency declaration in place.

Blue states like New Jersey, Oregon and Hawaii all voluntarily ended their emergency orders months ago. And red states like Texas and Georgia still have one in place. This isn’t a red-state / blue-state issue like Abudayyeh claims.

2. Illinois already got hundreds of billions in inflation-inducing federal bailouts. By Abudayyeh’s own admission, Pritzker is extending the state’s emergency to extract even more money from the federal government in the form of SNAP, Medicaid and stimulus payments.

That’s perverse considering Illinois’ public and private sectors have already received an unprecedented $186 billion in various federal COVID bailouts over the last few years. It’s those billions – and trillions overall in federal subsidies – that have flooded the national economy and left Illinois families struggling with record inflation.

Abudayyeh says Gov. Pritzker cares about “rising food prices.” But it’s the governor who owns part of the blame for the nation’s inflation crisis.

 It was Pritzker, along with other Illinois leaders in his party, who were some of the biggest cheerleaders for federal Covid bailouts. Illinois was the first state in the nation to beg for money when Senate President Don Harmon sent a $42 billion request to Congress.

And Gov. Pritzker spent the early part of the pandemic claiming the state would face extreme hardships without federal cash: “There’s no chance we won’t have to suffer severe, damaging cuts to higher education, to K-12 education, to basic services that people need if we don’t get any support,” the governor said.

The administration says it opposes ending its disaster declaration because that would cut the extra food stamp benefits for working families. But the irony is, more federal spending will only exacerbate the inflation crisis families are already suffering from, hurting the very people Pritzker purports to help.

3. The Pritzker administration wants additional federal dollars to help cover for Illinois’ many economic failures. Another fact Abudayyeh can’t say publicly is that the administration wants more money because Pritzker’s poor fiscal and economic policies – and those of his predecessors – have created a large dependency class in Illinois. Illinois has the nation’s 6th-highest percentage of residents on SNAP with one-sixth of Illinoisans enrolled in the program.

That dependency is not surprising considering the governor’s economic track record since he took office. Illinois’ real GDP has grown just 0.5 percent since Q1 2019, according to the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis data. Indiana grew more than 6 percent over the same period and Iowa 5.2 percent. Growth in all of Illinois’ neighbors far outpaced that in the Prairie State. 

Overall, Illinois’ GDP growth ranks 41st nationally (50 = worst) over the three-year period the governor has held the economic reins.

Anemic growth also means fewer jobs. The state’s 4.5 percent June unemployment rate has Illinois tied for the 4th-worst in the country, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. All of Illinois’ neighbors have a lower unemployment rate. Indiana’s is more than 2 percentage points lower.

So when Pritzker says the state needs more federal money, know it’s because his policies are leaving too many Illinoisans behind. 

In Illinois, it’s always about how many more people can be added to government dependency programs – instead of how many were lifted up and out of them.

Abudayyeh’s tweets

Read more from Wirepoints:

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• CTA crime problem begs for real deterrence: Half-measures won’t do
• Gov. Pritzker can’t have it both ways. He can’t claim he’s done a great job at managing Covid and yet still proclaim Illinois a “Disaster Area.”
• DeSantis’s Florida blows away entire country in competition for people and their wealth
• Pritzker Honed His Presidential Stump Speech In Florida – With Hatred And Dishonesty
• Chicago carjackings on pace for a 22-year high – and they’re getting more and more weaponized