Pritzker Signs Budget with $2 Billion Increase in Spending
Governor JB Pritzker signs the FY2019 budget Monday in Chicago. (Photo: Capitol News Illinois)
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Governor JB Pritzker signed the Fiscal Year 2026 budget into law Monday, spending $55.2 billion, an increase of $2 billion over the current fiscal year and a $15 billion increase since Pritzker took office in 2019.
“Despite all the uncertainty in these turbulent times facing the nation, Illinois’ fiscal year 2026 budget drives economic growth, it maintains the progress that we’ve made for working families and it continues our hard-earned fiscal responsibility,” Pritzker said.
The budget relies on $880 million in new revenue, including from a tax amnesty program, and increased taxes on business, sports betting, and tobacco and nicotine products.
Republicans criticized the budget for raising taxes and sweeping money from other state funds.
“This approach sets Illinois up for failure by FY27 and continues a pattern of short-term thinking,” House GOP Leader Tony McCombie (R-Savanna) said in a statement.
Pritzker defended a $1.3 million dollar payment to GardaWorld for the failed migrant tent city that was abandoned on Chicago’s southwest side, which Pritzker said at the time the state wouldn’t pay for.
“We had intended to not have to pay for that and we believe that we were not obligated to pay anything,” he said, noting GardaWorld sued the state in the Court of Claims.
“Rather than go through the entire process, there was a settlement that was reached over it. When you consider the total amount that was being spent to prepare that site, that settlement seemed like as good a deal as we could get in a settlement agreement,” Pritzker said.
House Speaker Chris Welch also defended a $40 million project at Proviso West High School in his district for a sports complex, where Welch graduated and once served as school board president.
Welch defended the spending as “a regional project” that will benefit the entire region.
“It’s going to be a major transformational economic development tool for that entire region. It’s going to help hotels. It’s going to help restaurants. It’s going to help communities build new housing because sports complexes drive economic development,” Welch said. “If you go through the budget, there’s a whole host of these regional projects that are in there.”
The budget goes into effect July 1.
