Capital Facts

Illinois comptroller candidate state Rep. Margaret Croke (D-Chicago) reported receiving the maximum campaign contribution of $72,800 from Gov. JB Pritzker on Feb. 19. Since then, Pritzker has appeared in some Croke campaign ads.
The day before the Pritzker contribution was reported, I spoke with incumbent Comptroller Susana Mendoza about the governor’s support of Croke - who once worked in Pritzker’s administration and has been a legislative ally - and the near certainty at the time that Pritzker would be contributing to Croke’s campaign.

As I write this, Gov. JB Pritzker is preparing to give his annual budget address. It’s an unenviable task.
Earlier this month, the Governor’s Office of Management and Budget released a report showing federal tax cuts caused a $587 million reduction in state revenues this fiscal year.
The governor announced last month that he was withholding $482 million in state spending to help mitigate federal attacks on the state budget.

The top three Democratic U.S. Senate candidates faced off twice last week.
The first debate wasn’t televised, so the live audience was quite small. The second debate was televised, so the audience was bigger.
However, these debates don’t attract even a smidgeon of the audience of presidential debates, when half the country often tunes in.
The object here is to generate video clips for TV ads and social media promotion, and to manage conventional news coverage, which can then be used in ads. Like it or not, that’s where most people will be exposed to the debates.

Remember the national uproar last November when U.S. Rep. Chuy Garcia bowed out of his reelection race at the last minute and quietly passed petitions to put his chief of staff Patty Garcia on the ballot?
We saw a lesser, but still quite palpable mass grumbling when state Rep. Marty Moylan (D-Des Plaines) did the same that month for his chief of staff Justin Cochran, who was subsequently appointed to the House by the district’s Democratic township committeepersons after Moylan resigned.