(bright music) (camera beeping) (dramatic music) - Welcome to "Capitol View," our weekly look inside and outside the Illinois State Capitol.

I'm Jennifer Fuller.

Our guests this week are Hannah Meisel of NPR Illinois, and Mike Miletich, the state house reporter for Gray TV.

Thank you both for joining us.

- Thanks for having us.

- Thank you.

- We're talking about things this week that I'm sure most people in Illinois and frankly elsewhere would rather not talk about, and it's because there's been another mass shooting in the United States, this time in Highland Park, Illinois, just ahead of a 4th of July parade.

As we record this, the GOP front nominee for governor, Darren Bailey, has had a news conference where he's talking about his plans for what gun control should look like in the state of Illinois.

Mike, I understand you were at that press conference.

I believe it included an apology for some words that Darren Bailey had on the day of the shooting, is that correct?

- It did and actually, right off the bat, Darren Bailey said that he apologized for comments that were made, honestly, within an hour of the news coming out that day.

He had some prayers in a video that was a campaign video.

There were a lot of people holding their signs, and he was ready to March in a parade that had to be canceled, and for right reason.

It wasn't too far away from where the shooting took place and during his prayer, he said that people should move on and be able to celebrate as anybody normally would on the 4th of July, but that quickly became a message that a lot of people had a problem with.

And he had a response to a few reporters over the weekend saying that he wouldn't have said anything like that, but today, he had a apology at the top of his press conference saying if he hurt anyone, that that was not what he was trying to do, and he feels terrible if he did.

He did take another Bible quote, trying to recover from what he said, but it definitely seemed like a comment that's going to hurt him with people, both sides of the aisle.

It doesn't matter if they're a Democrat or Republican.

It was quite a striking statement right after a mass shooting, that if he were to become governor one day, that would be people that you represent, and you're their leader.

So it was a very interesting comment that day.

- Certainly comments coming from Governor J.B. Pritzker as well, who is the Democratic nominee, and he's, of course, running for reelection.

And he had some pretty firm words in a response to a tweet from the NRA, basically telling gun rights advocates to leave Illinois alone, that we're in the midst of a mourning period.

Hannah, how is that going over?

- Well, I think for those who already support J.B. Pritzker, they are looking for someone with fighting words, someone who's willing to take on interests like the NRA.

You know, it's just a tweet, obviously it is.

Social media, obviously it can mean so much, for example, that video that Darren Bailey posted, not the best choice of words, immediate backlash, and I'm sure that we will look for those campaign ads from J.B. Pritzker, people and others who will spend money opposing Darren Bailey in the general election using his own words against him.

So, it's just a tweet.

The NRA said 94% of mass shootings happen in so-called gun-free zones.

These are government property, schools and other areas that firearms are now allowed.

And so, obviously, it wasn't the governor's team instead said, "Yes, well, "100% of mass shooting happen with guns."

You know, something like, "Leave Illinois the hell alone, that'd be great."

(laughs) So this is, you know, it's really interesting to have watched progressives rally around J.B. Pritzker in the last, I don't know, I guess a year maybe.

There has been obviously a lot of disappointment among Democrats of all stripes, not just progressives with the Joe Biden Administration.

The little that they've been able to do compared to campaign promises, and also just the losses that they've seen, not just at the Supreme Court in the last month, although that is definitely a huge factor there, but just in general.

So, progressives have been looking around to try to find someone who might primary Joe Biden.

Pritzker has been asked like a billion times now, it feels like, whether he'd want to do that.

Basically, his statement is that he's not gonna challenge Joe Biden, but that doesn't preclude him from running if Biden decides to not run again in 2024, but for now, we're still at the rhetoric stage.

Whether or not things will be done, that remains to be seen.

In Illinois, obviously we would be a state most poised to strengthen gun control laws what with a Democratic governor and democratically controlled state legislature.

A leading gun control advocacy group, GPAC, they have called for, I think on that day, they called the Legislature, "To act quickly to regulate weapons of war "that make mass shootings like today's "in Highland Park more deadly, "including registration of assault rifles "and semiautomatic handguns, "as well as limiting high capacity magazines."

Now, you'll notice that that does not ask for an all out ban on assault weapons, but that is where a lot of folks do want to go.

GPAC is a very strategic advocacy group run by professionals, and so they're being careful with their wording.

But there is a bill that has been sitting in the Illinois House for months, a bill, just like many others that go nowhere in Springfield that would ban assault weapons in Illinois, and you've seen a couple dozen progressive sign on to it in the last few days, but that does not mean necessarily that it's going anywhere, because you're not gonna be able to get any gun control legislation through without support from moderate Democrats, specifically leader, Jay Hoffman, who is from the Metro East, and that is an area that is very, very tricky because there is a culture there, a culture that I believe he is part of, that says guns are our Second Amendment right, and we need them for self defense and for hunting, is very tricky conversation, but if it were to be done anywhere, Illinois is very well set up to have this debate, but I'm not sure that there is political courage to make more than mouth movements.

But yeah, I think we'll talk about other things that we could regulate.

Jen, I'll throw it back to you, about why was the shooter able to get guns and a FOID card, despite his history of law enforcement being called because of concerning things going on within his home.

- Sure, Hannah, so let's talk a little bit about those conversations that are being had.

Obviously, this is still an open investigation in terms of what the shooter had planned, how the shooter was able to execute that plan, what might have been thwarted as a result of the arrest later in the day on the 4th of July.

And, Mike, there's been even some clarification coming from Illinois state police and other leaders in Springfield about these are the laws that are on the books.

These are some of the things that we had already been in contact with this shooter in terms of what some people might call red flag laws, those opportunities for family members, friends or others to say, "This person might be a problem, "and perhaps they should not have access to weapons."

Mike, can you tell us a little bit about that, and what's being talked about in that area?

- Right, there are several laws here in the state.

Obviously, a lot of people know that there's a lot of gun legislation Illinois has.

The gun restraining order law is one that a lot of people have highlighted is they see that the main problem that wasn't addressed here.

But the other key law that people could look at is the clear and present danger.

I mean, you look back at the past and the past situations the police have been called, understandably, as far as we know right now, did not involve guns.

It seemed situations where the gunman, that I will not name, was suicidal at one point, also threatened to kill his family.

He had many knives, a sword as well at a house, and those were removed from the house, but later returned to the father, because they claimed that they were not his.

It was actually the father's.

The interesting part that a lot of people are looking at right now is just a few months after that point, the son said that he was interested in getting a FOID card to become a legal gun owner in the state.

At that point, he was still underage for the FOID card though, and he needed someone to sign off for it.

And at that point, it was his father that signed off for that FOID card.

It's a very interesting back and forth right now, because clearly people could say, "Well, shouldn't there have been red flags that popped up?"

Or even if Illinois didn't have a FOID card system, wouldn't the background check be able to see if there were some problematic things, looking at his social media accounts.

He was a rapper that had several videos that showed violence and things of this sort, that there's more information coming out now as well, as some reporters have seen that there was a mural of a man with a gun with a huge smiley face over his face on the side of the house, very, very interesting symbolic things there that showed that he may have been thinking about this for a while.

In another new piece of information that we found just the other day was the fact that after he left Illinois, he went to Madison, Wisconsin, and wasn't planning to do anything there, but when he made it to Madison, Wisconsin, saw that there was this 4th of July celebration, like anywhere else across the country, and thought that he would be able to have another attack there.

Thankfully, that did not happen, but another community, obviously a completely different state is now learning what could have been.

And it's just leading to the conversation of when will these mass shootings come to an end?

We've had so many that it's hard to even count now, years and years of violence.

I talked with a state lawmaker this morning, that's from that area, the Highland Park representative, Bob Morgan, saying that it just needs to stop.

It doesn't matter if it was this gunman or the one before or the one before that.

He's talked to people that have lived through shootings in other states, even talking about Uvalde, Texas, and the fact that people have seen situations like these where there should have been red flags or possibly better gun legislation to put an end to this.

- Let's talk about the argument though, Hannah, give me just one second.

Let's talk about this argument that comes from those who are Second Amendment advocates, who say there are already laws on the books that should be able to stop this.

We need to increase support for mental health, for example, so that people who are in trouble can get the help that they need.

Hannah, are there laws on the books that are not being enforced?

And in what ways could the lawmakers, or perhaps the Executive Branch direct law enforcement and others to enforce those laws and try to put some more protections in place.

- So, Mike mentioned two separate laws, but I think they are being conflated.

There is a clear and present danger law that has been on the books for more than 30 years.

This is, if someone does something that is deemed very concerning, disturbing, just like the two incidents that the shooter had in 2019.

In April of 2019, police were called, because he attempted suicide.

But the thing is, it didn't really go further, because that requires sign off from those who are involved that they want to accept help.

And then in September of that year, that's when he threatened to kill people.

Police were called again and basically turned away.

No one wanted to make any sort of... you know, sign anything, anything of that nature.

And really, you can't really use the clear and present danger law after that.

If there's no affidavit made or something like that, it basically, the matter is closed.

And at that point, the shooter did not have a FOID card, did not have a FOID card application pending, so there was no FOID card to revoke or say, "You can't actually have this thing that you applied for."

And then the red flag law that most people talk about, the firearm restraining order, that's something that a law enforcement officer, a family member has to go to court to have that enforced.

That is a pretty high bar of evidence that would hold someone back.

And, again, even if that did happen, these things happened before he applied for a FOID card in December of 2019 with his father's... Basically his father sponsored him is the verbiage that's used.

And his father wasn't apparently aware of some of these things that happened in 2019, because his parents were estranged.

She was living with one.

He was living with the other.

And so, really, (sighs) the only thing that would, it's not like the laws were not enforced.

It's not like the laws were not used.

Perhaps the Highland Park police could have communicated to the ISP about that April, 2019 call in which he was deemed suicidal, but I'm not sure though, that ISP has some sort of database.

And, that also brings up privacy concerns and folks who are Second Amendment advocates would balk at any sort of database that's being kept on folks who would someday maybe be prevented from having a firearm.

And (sighs) Darren Bailey, in his press conference this Thursday morning, called for, he said basically it was a failure of the ISP.

He says that, but then on the other hand, five minutes later I'd asked a reporter to ask on my behalf, "Okay, you want these FOID card "restraining orders enforced better, "but you also don't even believe in the FOID card."

And he said, "Yeah, this FOID card is nothing but a scheme "to take money out of people's pockets."

It's a bad faith argument.

And yet, we're gonna have these conversations that run in circles.

One thing that perhaps the Legislature could do, because it's not like an executive branch agency can't do extra due diligence.

They can't do things that are outside the spoke of the law that they're empowered to implement.

But if the Legislature wanted, they could lower the standard of a clear and present danger threat, but that's all that, in this case, would've been prevented.

And of course, NRA folks, they have the extra advantage there, where they point to the fact that Highland Park Mayor, Nancy Rotering and her allies banned assault weapons in Highland Park and the NRA sued and basically took it to the Supreme Court.

The Supreme Court refused to take it up, and so the ban is in place.

Of course, it's not like Highland Park has 13 feet walls that are around, it preventing guns from coming in.

It's more of a political statement, and you can't have a gun shop that sells such things there, but really, we are limited in what we can prevent people from doing as long as we have the US Supreme Court reading the Second Amendment as they did in 2008 in the very monumental Heller case that says, "Second Amendment is a right "for individuals to bear firearms," whatever kind of firearms, so we have to work in the confines of that, and I don't really know what much that the Illinois Legislature could do.

Even if they did ban assault weapons, someone would sue, take it to the US Supreme Court, and I'm sure it would be struck down.

- Well, let's cross that bridge when we get to it.

But then there's been a lot of this talk about FOID cards, and you even mentioned this, Hannah.

Mike, what political appetite is there that you've been able to see that perhaps people would like to do away with the FOID card system in Illinois.

Illinois is a bit of an outlier in this part of the country when it comes to requiring some sort of registration or ID in order to purchase a gun or own a gun.

- Well, the state just actually improved the FOID system recently.

There was a FOID modernization law that was signed within the past year.

And I think it's important to note that, yes, there are people every single year, usually that are downstate Republicans that come forward and propose the bill to repeal the FOID Act, and it never goes anywhere, because at least with the state leadership that we have right now, they wanna make sure that the FOID system is there and in place.

And what they did more recently is said, "Okay, we understand most of the complaints that people have "is about the response time," especially if they're someone that's getting a first FOID card or someone that is trying to apply to get it renewed.

They're lowering the amount of time people have to wait for that, and also, made it a little bit easier, made the FOID and conceal carry license into one card and made it digital, so people could have it on their phone.

You'd have it right there with you.

I don't think that we'll see the FOID be dissolved at any point soon.

It could be a day, some point down the road where there's Republican leaders in both chambers and a Republican governor, but as for right now, I don't see that as a possibility of having a state without a FOID.

Yes, do people across Missouri, Indiana, Kentucky, all look over and say to their friends, "Hey, I don't have to deal with that.

It's a lot better."

There probably are those conversations.

I hear it a lot of times in my downstate markets.

But Senator Bailey bringing up the fact that we have these background checks that we already go through, and the Federal Government already regulates guns, we don't need the FOID system.

A lot of people disagree with his note that it's just a money grab.

But something else that I wanted to touch on is he said that an AR-15, like the gun that was used, is used for self defense.

That is just not a real argument right now.

Anyone that used that in the military, including US Senator, Tammy Duckworth, will say that people on normal streets do not have to have that type of gun, and she's used them.

She says that those do not belong in a normal citizen's hands.

- Certainly, we heard from that, heard that from her, I should say, earlier this week.

A short amount of time remaining, and of course there are a lot of other issues happening across the state, and I wanted to get to a few of those as well.

We've talked over the last couple of weeks since the Dobbs decision from the US Supreme Court.

We heard from Governor J.B. Pritzker that he intends to call a special session of the Illinois Legislature to talk about enhanced protections for both providers and those seeking abortion care in the state of Illinois, where abortion remains legal.

We heard this week that that special session, which could have come as early as this week, is going to be pushed off as they continue to work with stakeholders about what exactly they need from those protections, and then, making sure that they have the support that they need.

Hannah, in just a few minutes that we have remaining, will this happen before the legislative veto session, which is typically in the fall, will we see it yet this summer?

- Yeah, I think that Democrats want to keep this alive as a really potent issue to drive people out to the polls in November.

And so I do think that special session will happen at some time, either late summer or early fall, just to keep it fresh in voters' minds, Democratic voters, that is, because they do run the risk of animating even more Republicans voters, but again, it is Illinois.

Democrats are not terribly worried, especially with these new, even further gerrymandered maps.

They're not terribly worried about the Legislature.

They're not terribly worried about Governor J.B. Pritzker winning reelection.

And so, there has not been any specific list of, or even outline of what kind of bills he intended to call, and I think that's one part of the problem was that it wasn't solid yet.

There's been discussions about perhaps public funding for those coming to Illinois seeking abortions, because of course, we are now an island in the Midwest, aside from Minnesota.

States around us either already have, or will in the next few weeks, completely ban abortion after the Dobbs decision where Roe was overturned.

Another set of bills are that they're not solid yet, like you mentioned, Jen, protections for those seeking abortions, from protections for providers, especially those who are coming from out of state.

That is very tricky, because you're dealing with several jurisdictions, you're dealing with interstate commerce.

I just think that the ACLU and other interest groups needed more time to work on that language to test it, because, of course, these will all inevitably be tested in court once they pass.

And also, it's summer, there were attendance issues.

The Senate was scheduled to be back this week, but there are far fewer Senate members than there are in the House, and the House is where there were attendance issues.

- Mike, just a minute or so remaining.

Do you think that the appetite is there in the Legislature that this will pass with little trouble?

- I think that there is definitely enough Democrats that are on board to pass these changes.

But as Hannah mentioned, with the ACLU specifically talking about the legal challenges, they needed to have enough time to work out the right things that they could do, so that they won't have intense legal challenges once a law would pass.

One of the things that would not be happening during a special session, I asked the governor about, and several of the other democratic leaders, was providing money for basically transportation for people to come from one state to another.

That had been floated around for a little bit, and I think that there are many liberal Democrats that would like to see that happen, but it just wasn't going to be a possibility here in Illinois, but there is still a strong possibility that abortion legislation will be passed here during a special session.

I'm curious to see if there will be some gun legislation added in there, hearing a possibility of September, but we'll see when that session does happen.

- Certainly something to keep an eye on.

With that, we're out of time.

Mike Miletich, Hannah Meisel, thank you so much for joining us.

- Thank you.

- And thank you for joining us on "Capitol View."

I'm Jennifer Fuller, we'll catch you next time.

(dramatic music)