Rauner: 'Moral' Duty To Take Illinois Back From Unions, 'Corrupt' Insiders
From Crain's Chicago Business
With a series of titanic budget votes coming up fast, Gov. Bruce Rauner went into full campaign mode today, depicting himself as a man on a sacred mission to break the hold that "corrupt" insiders and labor unions have on the state's government and economy.
Speaking to a friendly business group here in Chicago, the state's new GOP governor appeared to pull no punches and signaled no interest in compromise—and, if anything, he seemed to lengthen the list of things on his agenda.
"We have a moral duty to act," Rauner told the Alliance for Illinois Manufacturing. "We have a duty to minimize how much we have to take from you. That money belongs to taxpayers."
Right now, Rauner said, "the unions control everything. There is not a school district in America that can withstand a strike of over a week." The result, especially here in Illinois, is "higher taxes. Deficit spending. It's a conflict of interest we've got to take care of."
Alluding to "tough votes" that will occur within a month or two in Springfield, Rauner said "special interests" are "yelling and screaming and trying to intimidate the process." But they have so weakened the Illinois economy that a "crisis has created the opportunity for structural change."
Rauner called for five changes in particular: "real reform" of the state's worker compensation system; tort reform to prevent trial lawyers from controlling the judiciary through campaign contributions; trimming the state's "uncompetitive" unemployment insurance program; a freeze of at least two years on "the nation's highest property taxes"; and "allowing local governments to decide for themselves" whether to ban closed union shops at private employers.
Read more in our daily News Update...
From Crain's Chicago Business
With a series of titanic budget votes coming up fast, Gov. Bruce Rauner went into full campaign mode today, depicting himself as a man on a sacred mission to break the hold that "corrupt" insiders and labor unions have on the state's government and economy.
Speaking to a friendly business group here in Chicago, the state's new GOP governor appeared to pull no punches and signaled no interest in compromise—and, if anything, he seemed to lengthen the list of things on his agenda.
"We have a moral duty to act," Rauner told the Alliance for Illinois Manufacturing. "We have a duty to minimize how much we have to take from you. That money belongs to taxpayers."
Right now, Rauner said, "the unions control everything. There is not a school district in America that can withstand a strike of over a week." The result, especially here in Illinois, is "higher taxes. Deficit spending. It's a conflict of interest we've got to take care of."
Alluding to "tough votes" that will occur within a month or two in Springfield, Rauner said "special interests" are "yelling and screaming and trying to intimidate the process." But they have so weakened the Illinois economy that a "crisis has created the opportunity for structural change."
Rauner called for five changes in particular: "real reform" of the state's worker compensation system; tort reform to prevent trial lawyers from controlling the judiciary through campaign contributions; trimming the state's "uncompetitive" unemployment insurance program; a freeze of at least two years on "the nation's highest property taxes"; and "allowing local governments to decide for themselves" whether to ban closed union shops at private employers.
Read more in our daily News Update...