(inquisitive music) (camera clicking) (air whooshing) (dramatic music) - Welcome to "Capitol View".

I'm Jak Tichenor sitting in for Jennifer Fuller this week.

Our contributors for this week's program are Dr. John Jackson, visiting professor at the Paul Simon Public Policy Institute at Southern Illinois University Carbondale and veteran statehouse correspondent, Dave Dahl from WTAX Radio in Springfield.

Good to have you both on the program this morning.

- Thank you, Jak.

- Glad to be with you, Jak.

- Let's start at the top.

Governor J.B. Pritzker is working at home this week in Chicago, after testing positive for COVID.

The governor says he's experiencing mild symptoms and taking antivirals to shake off the virus.

We wish him a full and speedy recovery.

Dave was telling me just before we started rolling that President Biden has also tested positive?

- Same deal, mild symptoms, and he's being treated with drugs, and I'm not sure the brand name that the governor's using and the brand name, you know, I don't know any of those drugs brand name, but sounds like a similar deal.

Work from home for a while.

As we're speaking on Thursday morning, the First Lady's tested negative.

- The governor, of course, picked up the virus over the weekend in Florida.

He was in Tampa rallying Democrats there at their Leadership Blue conference.

John, "Politico" reports that Pritzker delivered a fiery speech there equating Governor Ron DeSantis to former President Donald Trump, condemning the National GOP on a number of issues, including abortion and guns.

He said that DeSantis is really just Donald Trump with a mask on.

That message seemed to resonate there with the party faithful.

- Jak, this has a certain historic sensibility and logic about it because if Joe Biden chooses not to run, and I underscore that's a big if, then the Democrats would need a candidate in a hurry, and they're likely to turn to the governors as the most likely pool of candidates.

Most Americans, I think, don't recognize how much governors have come to dominate the pool of presidents and presidential candidates.

If you go back to the last eight presidents, four have been governors and that's by far the biggest category.

The next biggest category is vice presidents.

Of course, there are only two of those, Bush the first and Biden.

Only one senator, which I think people don't appreciate, 'cause there's always a ton of senators wanting to run and lining up and thinking they'd be a better president than whoever's in office.

But there's only been one senator since John Kennedy go straight from the Senate to the Oval Office and that's Illinois' own Barack Obama.

Before that, it was John Kennedy and in the whole 20th century, there were only two, both Kennedy and Harding.

So it's not that fertile a producer of presidents and Democrats got some governors that could fill the bill and Pritzker wants to be on that list, and I think that's reasonable supposition.

We're a big state, a blue state, and a very representative state.

And again, what I think is going to be different about 2014 is that the Illinois primary will count for a lot and Florida may because we're going to come early.

We're accustomed to New Hampshire and Iowa dominating that and New Hampshire and Iowa are not going to dominate this time.

New Hampshire and Iowa, particularly Iowa, will get much less attention, if any attention at all.

And so Illinois comes early on and so campaigning in Florida makes some sense for the governor.

Pritzker and Newsom of California are the two leading governors most often commented on and the story in "Politico" was very positive.

He went down to Florida and got very good reviews and Democrats seemed excited to hear from him in Florida.

So I think again, it's got logic and history behind it, but on the other hand, Joe Biden says he's running again, so this may be mostly moot speculation.

- But it's always fun.

And (laughing) you also can't rule out Vice President Kamala Harris as well.

She's likely to be a contender should the president decide to take a pass on this.

Dave, in your experience at the statehouse, how do these things shake down, as far as how the speculation goes around the building if a governor is potentially looking at raising the ante like that?

- The governor just happened to be in New Hampshire.

He just happened to be in Florida, how about that?

When he got in the first time, someone told me the plan was to serve two terms and then run for president.

As you folks aptly put it, you know, there's gonna be competition and would he shy away from running against Biden or Harris?

I think Harris has something she's gotta prove in terms of her qualifications, what she's done as vice president.

On the other hand, a lot of people have gotta be excited to have the first woman president.

She's a person of color and so I think she's a little bit of a wild card.

And as I said, if I'm Governor Pritzker, if only, if I'm Governor Pritzker, I'd wonder if I wanna run against these people who are in my party.

Now when he announced his run the second time, I said you don't get to be J.B. Pritzker without having a long game.

So what about, and he sounded surprised when I said Pennsylvania Avenue.

You know, "Oh, you mean like as a visitor?"

And he said he's too concerned with being governor and running for governor to be thinking about anything else, which everybody says is malarkey and you know I'm not thinking of malarkey.

You know, he's got so many concerns going, including a family, he's a father, that it's clear he can spin more than one plate in the air.

And then just after the primary, he did a series of interviews and he said that he wants to be governor for another four years.

And I said, "Four?"

And he said, "Yes, four."

And I said, "If that turns out to be different, I'll come back to you."

I'm sure if he's announcing for president in 2024, he'd be saying, "Well, people have asked for this and after I've studied everything, et cetera, I've decided to do it."

You know, I'm not sure what someone like Pritzker would think as the advantage of 2028 versus 2024.

You know, he's a young guy, he's still in his 50s and so he definitely would have time.

You know, he may and he may not is basically what I think.

- I think it's anybody's guess at this point, wouldn't you agree with that?

- I'm sorry, I was gonna say with Biden, you know with Trump, those guys are both in their 70s.

And Biden's 79 right now.

If he's reelected, you know, where are the young leaders of the party if he's gonna sit in the White House another four years?

- Let's talk about the governor's race because that's the next thing that's got to happen.

The news this week from the "Chicago Tribune's", Rick Pearson is that Republican candidate Darren Bailey has raised more than $11.9 million since he announced his candidacy in February of last year and he spent roughly 11.7 million in addition to more than $363,000 in cash that he had on him to start off the month of July.

He's reporting $246,000 and change in debts and loans that he and his wife have given to the campaign.

So he's got an uphill battle.

Where do we think that the money's going to funnel into the Bailey campaign?

One of his biggest boosters during the primary, of course, was Uihlein, can he be counted on, John?

- Well, Jak, Uihlein did the lion's share.

He gave 9 million of the 12 million, so he gave three fourths right there and he could give again.

He's come this far, he may wanna protect his investment.

Ken Griffin has given 50 million.

Maybe he really is dedicated enough, he'll change horses and come back and there are other Republican billionaires around.

So that's one line of possibility.

I think the bigger question is, what about the Trump base of the Republican party?

Trump has been phenomenal as a fundraiser.

He raised for his political PAC, $250 million.

Now that's a good and a bad if you're Bailey because the good side is Trump could help, but bad side is Trump hasn't helped much of anybody except himself so far with that $250 million.

So would Trump step in and help candidates that he has endorsed and wants to help out?

That certainly remains to be seen.

But the more important prospect is will those Trump voters, many of whom have already sent money to the president, will they come back to the state level and give again?

Because obviously Bailey needs lots of grassroots support.

Will they rally around, that remains to be seen, but he surely needs them to do so.

- Dave, you've got your finger on the pulse of how Central Illinois is looking at the presidential contest and, excuse me, the governor's contest.

What do you think?

- I've gotta think there's gonna be PAC money for Bailey and you're not gonna out-raise Pritzker, I wouldn't think you would anyway.

And in my opinion, you don't need the most money.

I mean, look at Griffin and Irvin.

He may as well set that money on fire or flush it down the toilet, at least you could see it, you know, swirl around on its way down.

You don't need the most money.

You need enough money to get your message out.

And the question is, of course, how much is it?

You've got some major TV markets and that seems to be what it's all about, Chicago and St. Louis.

Again, how do you get your message out so a majority of the voters choose you?

And I think that's a question that Bailey and the people who are backing him have to answer.

Either come right out and say it, or show it by raising the money.

- I wanna switch over to a different topic.

There's more fallout this week from the July 4th Highland Park mass shooting.

"Capitol News Illinois" reports that the Illinois State Police will start using a broader definition of what constitutes a clear and present danger when they're reviewing a person's Firearm Owner's Identification Card request.

That's a factor that ISP considers when they decide whether or not to grant someone a FOID card or to revoke or suspend it if one's already been issued.

Dave, what are your thoughts on that?

Is that going to make a difference?

Because there was concern that in the case of the Highland Park shooter, his dad ended up sponsoring him for the FOID card, despite the earlier visits by police to their residence.

- Well, the gun people say that the criminals do not follow the law and they're right.

I think when you take a step back, you've gotta wonder what constitutes a violation or an infringement on the Second Amendment.

You know, our founding fathers said a well-regulated militia, they didn't say AR-15, or what have you.

And one thing that is not lost on me, and if you're someone like me, I feel for you.

But if you're someone like me, you're on the receiving end of countless emails and a lot of them have been from the state police trying to get out in front of and trying to tell their story of how someone like the fellow in Highland Park was legally able to get a weapon, what the FOID process is, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.

And you know, they put Director Brendan Kelly out there.

It's clear to me, and I'm not saying this as a pejorative, but it's clear to me that they're really putting on a media strategy to try to answer the inevitable questions.

And all you've gotta do in my opinion is figure out who in the near future is gonna commit a terrible crime and find that person and stop him.

And, you know, in a lot of these cases, it's with a legal weapon and I'm trying to remember the details of the fellow from Tazewell County who went to Tennessee and shot up a Waffle House.

His dad's in trouble, and you look at the Kenosha kid and his name escapes me at the moment.

But, you know, that teenager who practically walked across border and now I- - Kyle Rittenhouse, I think was his name.

- Yeah, exactly.

Was it Kenosha or Milwaukee?

I mean, these things are so, they read a list of all these cities where this has happened in the recent months or years, I don't even remember all of them.

- And it's not just AR-15s because a lot of the gun violence in Illinois comes from handguns.

John, how does this kind of change the playing field to try and keep guns of all kinds out of the hands of people who might be a threat to the public and themselves?

- Well, I think the key on these red flag laws and the state police effort and so forth is trying to get family responsibility and involvement at the start.

If you look at all the major mass shootings, if you go back to Sandy Hook in Connecticut, Parkland in Florida, certainly Highland Park, there was very substantial family involvement, and very much the family helping enable these young people to get these weapons.

So I do think it's an effort to get families more involved and more aware of their role.

I think the key is to take these assault weapons, these military grade weapons off the streets and get them to be much less plentiful and ideally stop the sale and the spread, but that's going to be very difficult to do and looks like it's impossible to do politically in this country.

But that's the much bigger lift and the Congress is not up to it, general assembly is not up to it.

So we're talking about trying to help at the margins, but the families are an important variable here.

- I wanna build on what John said, the professor said, if that's okay, Jak.

- Absolutely.

- I don't care what you think, I'll go there.

Sandy Hook was kids from rich white families, and a lot of 'em are Republicans, and to me, that's hard to ignore.

And I posed that to Rodney Davis, a soon to be former Congressman, Central and Southern Illinois.

Furthermore, Davis, as he is want to remind us occasionally, he was on the ball field when Steve Scalise got shot.

So, you know, he was running from an active shooter.

After Sandy Hook, nothing changed.

After Steve Scalise got shot, nothing's changed.

Not enough, not nearly enough.

And as you folks have said, they don't have the political will do it, you know, my cold dead fingers.

And, you know, I don't have the answers.

I don't happen to be a gun person.

I mean, it just isn't germane to any part of my life.

But to say to the gun people, well, we're the ones who obey the law and we have Second Amendment rights and anything, you know, even so much as a FOID card is unconstitutional.

There's an argument to be made there.

I would say that, I mean, to be even more coarse about it, we all drive cars, sometimes we get into accidents and sometimes someone is killed and we don't ban 'em.

And so when you're going to war, you think of acceptable losses.

You know, if we defeat Country A and we lose 1,000, 2,000, 10,000 American lives, you know you're gonna lose some, and those are acceptable losses for the greater good.

And the people who die in car crashes, you know, they must be acceptable losses because we don't really put in any new laws and I'm wondering if, to the people who advocate for gun rights, that these school shootings, workplace shootings are semi-regularly occurring events that don't have anything to do with my Second Amendment rights, so don't change the Second Amendment rights.

And I'm wondering if the Uvalde kids, the Sandy Hook kids, people at the next workplace that gets shot up, probably somewhere today, if those people are the acceptable losses for the rights that we have.

- Well, before we move on, I was gonna say there are some measures that are being contemplated in the legislature.

Of course, Senator Julie Morrison, whose district contains Highland Park, says that momentum is building for an assault weapons ban in the State of Illinois.

And on the Republican side of the aisle, there's a move by State Representative Mark Batinick of Plainfield to hold parents criminally liable for any damages caused by minor children whenever parents consent to having their child obtain a FOID card.

So there still is some, I think, there's still some appetite in the general assembly to get something done after Highland Park.

- Well, they've got super majorities here on both sides of the chamber or both chambers, and of course, in the executive branch.

It's interesting to note that Senator Morrison was in the parade with, no she wasn't in the parade, she was at the parade, and Mark Batinick from Plainfield is a moderate Republican who's not running again.

I don't know if that means anything, it's just interesting to note.

- All comes into account.

Wanna move on to some other things that we're looking at this week.

The Illinois Department of Employment Security is announcing earlier this week that the state's reached a new historic low of continued claims for regular state unemployment insurance benefits.

Since the beginning of that series, back in January of '87, the state's remained below the previously recorded low of 70,454 continued claims for 10 weeks.

That's certainly good news, but the question remains, John, are we going to be able to keep up that momentum, especially with the idea of looking at the possibility of maybe moving into a recession as some financial experts believe?

- Well, that's the question and the administration and the Fed would very much like to know the answer.

Unemployment nationally is at 3.6.

We've come back from the pandemic job losses, regained all of those, and we came back faster than I think anybody expected, and we have more jobs growth.

It's really historic in the modern economy, but can you keep it going without inflation?

The Feds have control over fiscal policy.

The Congress and the president have basic control, well, Congress and president have fiscal policy and the Fed has monetary policy and they don't always coordinate.

And what they both want is to tamp down the inflation, which could entail loss of jobs and the unemployment rate going up.

But they want to achieve that with the so-called soft landing, but they've got very blunt instruments for doing that.

So the states, like everybody else, are very much involved with this because their flow of cash the next fiscal year and the one after that's likely to depend on the answer.

- And that's a good segue to the next topic and that has to do with state finances.

The Illinois' Bipartisan Commission on Governmental Finance and Accountability, known as CGFA, is reporting that the state's fiscal year that closed out at the end of June, base receipts were doing extremely well, growing by $730 million in June and the state's general revenues hit the $50 billion mark for the first time in history.

The question is, how long is this going to continue?

Because we had that influx of federal money for COVID relief, Dave, you monitor the state's fiscal health on a regular basis.

The Republicans are saying, at some point, you're gonna have a fiscal cliff to dive off of because we've been on this sugar high from all the COVID money.

- Yeah, you know, the Republicans are gonna find a way to go negative about it.

You know, you talk about the jobs or those necessarily head of household jobs, one for one or 1.1 for one that are post COVID, et cetera.

And also with the money, the Republicans will find a way to poke holes in that.

They've already poo-pooed the corrected census that shows we have more Illinoisans than ever.

I was just on a trip across several states and every time I saw a U-Haul truck or trailer, I said, "There's somebody else moving out of Illinois, the only business that's doing well is U-Haul."

So the Republicans have burned in that message, at least in my mind, and I burned it into the minds of my wife and son, so it's a lot of fun to travel.

But nevertheless, if I'm a Republican, I've gotta find a way to say this really isn't good news.

Maybe the numbers are fake, maybe they're caffeinated up.

We'll see what happens when we don't get the federal money anymore and Governor Bailey is gonna do better.

If the Republicans, I've gotta find a way to tell that story.

- No question about that.

John, from your perspective, you watched the state's finances over the years.

At this point, we're not looking at $17 million in back bills like we did during the Rauner Madigan budget impasse, so the state's rainy day fund is up now almost to a billion dollars.

The state has turned around.

Those are pretty hard facts to argue with, though, as Dave suggests though, some will.

- These are good budget numbers, no matter how it spins from the other side.

The administration's going to run on fiscal management, the governor's going to run on that.

The comptroller certainly will, treasurer will, a great number of Democratic candidates for House and Senate will run on that because it's a real story with real data backing it up.

State's in better shape fiscally than I think I've seen it since I've lived in this state and the fact that the New York bond houses have recognized that, we were teetering on junk bond status, and now we're not and we got out of that situation with a lot of positive things like the rainy day fund and so forth.

So there's gonna be a battle over it, whether or not it can stand up to the long run is uncertain, but CGFA and Government's Office of Management and Budgets say they have factored into their planning the loss of those federal funds.

- We're gonna have to end on that note, John.

Thanks very much, John Jackson, visiting professor at the Paul Simon Public Policy Institute at SIU Carbondale and Dave Dahl, the veteran statehouse correspondent for WTX Radio in Springfield, thank you both gentlemen.

- [Dave And John] Thank you.

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