Politics
SPRINGFIELD – Teachers and other education professionals are urging the Illinois State Board of Education to reduce the amount of time students spend on standardized tests each year and to adopt a new testing system that produces more useful information to help teachers improve their instruction. “One thing that we’re saying and that our members…
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A record state operating budget that a top legislative Republican said “has a little bit of something for everyone” is heading for final votes in the Missouri General Assembly as tax revenue continues to pour into the treasury in historic amounts. Final figures weren’t available Wednesday, but the spending plan that emerged from a day of negotiations…
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CHICAGO — Attorney General Kwame Raoul has joined a multistate coalition of eight attorneys general urging President Biden to fully cancel federal student loan debt owed by every federal student loan borrower in the country. The coalition urges the president to immediately exercise his authority under the Higher Education Act to cancel the more than…
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Illinois has 6,032 local governments, the most in the nation by a wide margin – and that excludes 859 school districts. It’s the main reason Illinoisans pay the nation’s second-highest property taxes. You’d expect a state with fewer people after eight consecutive years of population loss would need less government. Wrong: Illinois has more government than any…
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QUINCY — The two incumbents running for Illinois’ 15th District made their pitches to the Quincy Tea Party Tuesday night at the Town and Country Inn. Republicans Rodney Davis and Mary Miller are now running for the redistricted seat that represents much of the I-72 corridor of Illinois, including Adams, Brown, Pike and Hancock Counties.…
Read Full Article QUINCY — Congressmen Rodney Davis (R-IL) and Sam Graves (R-MO) spent time at a Quincy business to talk about how government can assist with the logistics and transportation of small businesses. Officials with Kohl Wholesale gave the legislators a tour of Kohl’s facilities on Illinois 57, including their distribution center, which opened in 2018, and…
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U.S. Representative Rodney Davis (R-IL) released the following statement after news reports of a draft U.S. Supreme Court (SCOTUS) opinion striking down the Roe v. Wade abortion decision was leaked: “As a Pro-Life lawmaker, I’ve long advocated for an end to the ‘Roe’ decision. It was wrong from the beginning, and I hope the Court’s pending decision empowers states…
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CHICAGO – Governor Pritzker today condemned the reported Supreme Court draft opinion to overturn Roe v. Wade, allowing states to enact even more restrictive anti-choice laws that would deny woman’s access to reproductive health care. Early in his term, Governor Pritzker signed the Reproductive Health Act to protect Illinois women in anticipation of a conservative Supreme Court overturning Roe. “The terrifying implications…
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Two bills on Gov. J.B. Pritzker’s desk could expand Illinois highway camera monitoring program to cover 6,600 more miles of road across 22 counties as the General Assembly looks to crack down on expressway crime before November elections. House Bill 260 and House Bill 448 – passed alongside 80 other proposals in the final dayof the legislative session – would see…
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QUINCY — God, Guns and fighting the “Woke” Liberal agenda. That was the message Congresswoman Lauren Boebert (R-CO) brought to Quincy while stumping for her friend, Congresswoman Mary Miller (R-IL), on Saturday. It was billed as a “Defend the Second Amendment Rally” at the Holiday Inn, but when talking about a Conservative agenda and predicting…
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Amid a wave of anti-LGBTQ legislation pushed nationwide, the Missouri House passed a pair of bills Thursday that would limit transgender students from participating on the sports teams that match the gender they identify with. One bill, which originally dealt with school transportation, would restrict transgender students to only participating on high school sports teams of…
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Gov. J.B. Pritzker defended his mandate that gas stations owners post stickers at the pump announcing his delay of a gas tax increase or pay $500 daily fines. “There’s no political speech involved there, at all,” Pritzker said April 27. “And, here’s what we’re doing. We’re lowering the impact on people of the rise in prices of…
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SPRINGFIELD — Gov. JB Pritzker signed a package of bills Wednesday aimed at easing the state’s shortage of teachers and other education professionals, even as a new report shows Illinois just added a record number of new teachers to its ranks. Speaking in the library of Springfield High School just blocks from the Capitol, Pritzker…
Read Full Article Congressman Rodney Davis (R-IL) says eliminating student loan debt is “morally wrong” and is supporting legislation to block President Joe Biden from permanently extending student loan forbearance that has been in place since almost the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic. “The debt isn’t just magically eliminated with the stroke of a pen,” Davis said. “It…
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QUINCY — Congresswomen Mary Miller (R-IL) and Lauren Boebert (R-CO) will be in Quincy on Saturday as part of a “Defend the Second Amendment Rally”. Miller is running in the June 28 15th District Republican primary against Congressman Rodney Davis (R-IL) as both were lumped in the same Congressional District following redistricting controlled by Illinois…
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QUINCY — J. Robert Gough talks with Chicago Tribune reporter Ray Long, who penned the book “The House That Madigan Built”, which chronicles the rise and fall of the longest tenured statehouse speaker in U.S. History. Long also discusses the involvement of long-time Madigan consigliere Mike McClain, the retired lobbyist and lawmaker from Quincy, who…
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At the MotoMart store in Sauget, Illinois, drivers are paying $4.30 at the pump, 20 cents more a gallon than the national average thanks to the Prairie State being No. 2 in the nation for gas taxes. But a quick drive across the Mississippi River to St. Louis, Missouri, and drivers pay $3.85 per gallon…
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JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. — Missouri has recovered more than 95 percent of the jobs lost during the COVID-19 pandemic, according to the Missouri Chamber’s latest quarterly economic report. Missouri is among states leading in job recovering after adding back 357,200 of jobs lost, according to Ted Abernathy, managing partner of Economic Leadership LLC. “Ten states have made it back…
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SPRINGFIELD – Illinois on Thursday received its second credit rating upgrade from Moody’s Investors Service within one year, moving up one notch but remaining in the worst shape of the 50 states. It’s the third upgrade between the three major credit ratings agencies during Gov. JB Pritzker’s tenure, the other coming last year from Standard…
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SPRINGFIELD – Gov. JB Pritzker signed a package of bills Tuesday that make up a roughly $46 billion Fiscal Year 2023 state general revenue funds budget that includes increased funding for education and human services and $1.8 billion in mostly-temporary tax relief. Pritzker signed the bill during a ceremony at Chicago State University where he…
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www.mjbizdaily.com CHICAGO — A group calling itself True Social Equity in Cannabis sued three marijuana multistate operators and an ancillary company in Illinois federal court, claiming the four constitute a “Chicago cartel” linked by the wealthy Pritzker, Wrigley and Kovler families. The nine-page lawsuit was filed this week in U.S. District Court for the Northern District of…
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SPRINGFIELD – Gov. JB Pritzker signed his final first-term budget into law Tuesday, a roughly $46 billion spending plan buoyed by pandemic-driven revenue windfalls and a current-year surplus that helped the state pay down debts and offer temporary tax relief. Between the three budget-related bills signed Tuesday – House Bill 900, House Bill 4700 and Senate Bill 157 – as…
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With the end of the legislative session only weeks away, and organizers of an initiative petition campaign sounding the alarm about an even more pressing deadline, dueling efforts to legalize marijuana in Missouri face uncertain fates. In the legislature, GOP state Rep. Ron Hicks is sponsoring a bill to legalize possession and use of marijuana for…
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SPRINGFIELD – A state appellate court ruled this week that it will not block enforcement of the Pritzker administration’s mandate that certain categories of public employees either be vaccinated against COVID-19 or undergo regular testing. The 2-1 ruling by the 4th District Court of Appeals upheld a Sangamon County judge’s decision on April 1 not to issue a…
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The new budget for fiscal year 2023 includes Gov. J.B Pritzker’s election-year suspension of the 1% grocery tax, but a few months after the next governor’s inauguration, it will be back. Grocery stores must advertise the suspension, by law, on customer receipts. If that isn’t feasible, they must display a 4-inch by 8-inch bold sign. Either…
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