Illinois passes $56B budget –
Lawmakers approved the state budget early Monday morning after slogging through the night, enacting new taxes on businesses and authorizing less spending than what Gov. JB Pritzker proposed in February.
Illinois’ newly passed FY27 budget, at $55.9 billion, is being marketed as a democrat victory for affordability and fiscal responsibility.
State is choosing short-term political optics over long-term fiscal health, relying on temporary tax pauses and one-time relief while deferring hard choices about spending and revenue.
Temporary Fixes, Not Real Solutions
The so-called “affordability” measures are largely temporary:
- Motor Fuel Tax Pause: Delaying a scheduled gas tax hike for six months doesn’t reduce costs—it merely postpones them. When the pause ends, families will face the same increases, now potentially compounded by inflation.
- Sales Tax Holiday: A 10-day sales tax break benefits those who shop for school supplies during a narrow window, but does nothing for families struggling year-round with rent, utilities, or groceries.
- $400 One-Time SNAP Replacement: This emergency payment is a stopgap, not a strategy. It punishes families for federal policy changes while offering no path to sustainable income support or job creation.
These are political band-aids, not structural reforms.
Spending Growth Without Accountability
The budget continues a trajectory of aggressive spending growth: - K–12 Education: Another $350 million poured into the Evidence-Based Funding formula, bringing total annual spending to $9.2 billion. While education is vital, there’s little public evidence that continued funding increases correlate with improved student outcomes in Illinois.
- Housing Programs: $250 million is allocated for new housing initiatives, but Illinois already has a crowded array of affordable housing programs with mixed results. Without accountability measures, this risks becoming another layer of bureaucracy rather than real housing production.
- Medical Debt Relief: Adding $5 million to a program that has already erased over $1 billion in debt sounds impressive, but the program’s long-term sustainability and cost-effectiveness remain unclear.
Illinois is spending more, but not necessarily spending smarter.
No Tax Reform, Just Tax Delays
Leaders boast that no income or sales tax rates were raised. True—but that’s a low bar. The state is still relying on existing high tax rates to fund expanding programs, discouraging business investment and prompting outmigration. Delaying a gas tax increase is not tax reform; it’s tax avoidance.
Illinois remains one of the highest-taxed states in the nation, with a regressive flat income tax, high property taxes, and a complex web of fees. Until the state tackles its overall tax burden, “affordability” will remain a slogan, not a reality.
Blaming Washington, Avoiding Responsibility
The budget release repeatedly blames the Trump Administration and federal cuts for economic uncertainty. While federal policy impacts the state, Illinois has its own structural challenges: - Chronic pension underfunding (even with current contributions)
- Cumbersome regulatory environment
- High business taxes driving companies out of state
- Inefficient government operations
Blaming Washington let state leaders off the hook for decades of poor fiscal management.
The Real Test: Sustainability and Results
The eighth consecutive “balanced” budget sounds impressive—until you ask: - Are pension liabilities actually declining meaningfully?
- Are students achieving better outcomes with billions more in education spending?
- Is housing actually becoming more available and affordable?
- Are businesses choosing Illinois over neighboring states?
If the answer to these questions is no, then this budget is a balancing act of accounting, not a blueprint for prosperity.
Bottom Line
Illinois’ FY27 budget prioritizes political messaging over fiscal discipline. It offers temporary relief instead of permanent reform, expands spending without clear accountability, and blames federal policy for problems that are largely homegrown. Working families deserve more than one-time payments and sales tax holidays—they deserve a state that lowers taxes, reduces bureaucracy, and creates real economic opportunity.
Legislators’ pay was not frozen, so base pay rises by about $1,600+.
For now, Illinois has chosen spending over savings, slogans over solutions, and blame over accountability. That’s not leadership—that’s political theater.
Legislature fails to get @ChicagoBears deal into the endzone. But, Illinois has an official state bee, the largest state budget in Illinois history that includes all kinds of new taxes and rideshare drivers can unionize — if the governor signs these bills, among 395 total bills that passed both chambers this spring session. See them all in their tens of thousands of pages of legalese and legislative speak here: ilga.gov/Reports/Previe…)
No Republicans voted for the plan, though some House lawmakers said they were at least more involved in budget negotiations than in recent years.
Lawmakers incorporated a pair of the tax changes that Pritzker had proposed in February. One would lower the cap on corporate net operating loss deductions for business. Another would impose a tax on social media companies based on the number of users the platform has in Illinois. Combined, those would generate $500 million in new revenue.
In the 11th Hour of the General Assembly session, the Senate advanced a Bill that would mean that the village of Arlington Heights would own the land the Bears Stadium is on, so the land would not be Property Taxable, meaning the City, the Schools, NONE of the property taxing bodies would receive any funding from the land. Which basically means all of the property tax payers would be Fucked.
Congratulations Springfield! Another Disaster.
YAY, Crazy unbearable traffic coupled with ZERO property tax assistance… WHAT COULD GO WRONG?!
“Once again, Illinois Democrats jammed through a massive, nearly $56 billion state budget in the dead of night, giving taxpayers and legislators little to no time to review what’s actually in it. Worse yet, House Rules were suspended to fast-track this legislation, preventing the thorough debate and transparency Illinois families expect and deserve.
“At a time when working families are struggling with rising costs, this budget grows government instead of delivering real relief. A $55.9 billion spending plan, the largest in state history, should demand careful review and bipartisan input, not backroom deals and last-minute votes.
“The people of Illinois expect honesty, transparency, and fiscal responsibility from their government. I voted ‘No’ on HB 111 because Illinois deserves a better budget process—one that respects taxpayers, lawmakers, and the principles of open government.”
The Senate just passed legislation allowing out-of-state illegal immigrants to receive in-state tuition rates at all Illinois public universities.
You can’t make this stuff up.
The university bureaucracies love it because it means more revenue. Illinois families get the bill. At a time when tuition is already too high, Springfield is once again putting everyone else ahead of the taxpayers who actually live here.
Today, I voted NO on the Fiscal Year 2027 state budget. This budget spends $55.9 billion, the largest budget in Illinois history. It also includes nearly $800 million in new taxes and fees.
Illinois does not have a revenue problem. The problem is with spending. Since Governor Pritzker took office, state spending has increased by nearly 40% while taxpayers continue to hear the same excuses and see the same results.
This is what’s in the new budget:
- Nearly $800 million in new taxes and fees.
- At least $220 million in pork projects and political earmarks.
- Approximately $410 million in spending on illegal immigrant programs and services.
- No meaningful property tax relief.
- No increase in the Local Government Distributive Fund, leaving communities with the same 6.47% share they received last year.
The people I represent expect government to focus on public safety, affordability, and responsible spending. Instead, Illinois Democrats have produced another record-breaking budget and simply handed taxpayers the bill.
The process was just as disappointing as the product. Republicans were largely shut out of negotiations, leaving millions of Illinois residents without the voice of their elected representative during budget discussions.
Illinois families have already absorbed 57 tax and fee increases under Governor Pritzker, costing taxpayers more than $77 billion. This budget continues that trend. Taxpayers deserve better stewardship of their money
The Illinois general assembly passed a $55 billion budget without a Bears stadium bill.
The Illinois Senate overnight passed last-ditch effort aimed at keeping the Bears in Illinois, that essentially creates the chance for municipalities to own stadiums. That would mean the Bears would pay $0 in property taxes, but pay taxes on the development around a stadium.
The Illinois House did not take up a vote on the bill, and the general assembly adjourned.
In a statement early Monday, the Bears said “We will finalize our evaluation of both Arlington Heights and Hammond, and remain on the late spring/early summer timeline that we have previously communicated. We will provide an update when we have a decision to share.”
The budget, without a Bears’ stadium bill, now heads to Gov. JB Pritkzers desk.
Let’s breakdown the facts. Eight years under Governor Pritzker:
📈State spending up $16 billion (+40%)
💰Illinois families paying $1,700 more in taxes
💼Highest unemployment rate in the Midwest (4th in the nation)
🏡Highest property taxes in America
✂️Cut the Property Tax Relief Fund
🚌School transportation funding reduced
⚡️Energy bills soaring across the state
And that’s just scratching the surface.
Illinois families are paying more and getting less.
Senator Cristina Castro-led ban on cellphones in schools heads to governor.
http://ilsenatedems.co/Ei3i50Z5Yks
Springfield is celebrating a “gas tax freeze.”
Reality?
They’re not cutting your gas taxes.
They’re not even pausing them.
They’re postponing the next automatic gas tax increase for six months.
The increase is roughly a penny per gallon.
In Springfield, delaying a tax hike by one penny is considered tax relief. 🤦♂️🤦♂️🤦♂️
JB Pritzker is lying to us.
He and his administration worked to ram through a megaprojects bill that would’ve given billionaire developers a 40-year property tax freeze.
The numbers for the Bears were brutal: a $39 million annual handout — $1.5 billion over 40 years — shifted straight onto the backs of Illinois homeowners already crushed by some of the highest property taxes in America.
JB called this “a pretty good deal.” His team negotiated until the final hours because they wanted it done.
Then taxpayers and lawmakers started asking the obvious question:
Why are we giving a 40-year tax freeze to billionaires while families drown in property taxes?
And just like that, the votes vanished. The deal died. And suddenly — magically — JB Pritzker opposed it all along.
He says he “wasn’t willing to give up billions of dollars of taxpayer money” for a billionaire-owned team and that protecting taxpayers was always his “North Star.”
What a shameless liar.
Until this deal collapsed, Pritzker was perfectly willing to sell Illinois taxpayers down the river.
Friends, Democrats control Illinois, and JB Pritzker is their king. He doesn’t get to rewrite history and pretend he wasn’t in on this corporate giveaway the second it became politically toxic.
He owns this.
Roy F. McCampbell's Blog 