Rich Miller

More legislators than you may realize have received credible threats of violence or have been stalked. Most refuse to talk about it for the record, but those shootings showed what could’ve happened to them and what still may happen in the future.

Human beings tend to wait until the last minute to do things. But the leaders need to start enforcing earlier deadlines for giant issues like this energy proposal so they can deal with other time-sensitive things (the budget and revenues, for instance) at the end.

For quite a while now, most folks in politics have assumed that Illinois Secretary of State Alexi Giannoulias and Comptroller Susana Mendoza will probably run for mayor of Chicago in 2027.

The U.S. House’s Energy and Commerce Committee released its recommendations for budget reconciliation. A preliminary review by the Congressional Budget Office projected that, if implemented, at least 8.6 million Americans would lose Medicaid coverage during the coming decade.

Needless to say, replacing an appropriations committee chair with barely two weeks to go in the spring session and tough budget votes ahead is not exactly commonplace. I’ve never seen such a thing in 35 years of doing this.

A top legislative budget negotiator last week said rank-and-file legislators will very soon have to come to terms with a state budget environment unlike anything many have ever seen before.

If Pritzker’s governance does start slipping because he’s running for higher office, I pledge to let my opinion be known. I will not stand for it. This state is far too important.

Gov. JB Pritzker said last week that the extreme uncertainty with the U.S. government and the international economy might mean that the legislature may have to reconvene to reconfigure the state budget after it adjourns at the end of next month.

You’ve probably read about the Republican Party’s implosion last week in suburban municipal and township campaigns, particularly in DuPage County.

The state imposes an additional sales tax in the Regional Transit Authority’s jurisdiction. Last week’s study found that expanding those specific RTA sales taxes to services could generate an additional $315 million a year.

State Rep. Marty Moylan, D-Des Plaines, chair of the House Transportation: Rail Systems, Roads & Bridges Committee, is heading into the transit funding discussions armed with an inch-and-a-half-thick binder filled with CTA salary data.

Advocates say a major storm is brewing that could overwhelm the state’s child foster care system.

The latest report from the Center for Tax and Budget Accountability shows that spending on “core” state services in the governor’s proposed fiscal 2026 budget will be 9.1% less in real dollars than it was in fiscal 2000.

Illinois House Speaker Chris Welch didn’t sound all that enthused about passing any new ethics reforms during an interview last week.

Mike Madigan knew for a very long time that the U.S. Attorney’s office and the FBI badly wanted to put his head on a spike.