SPRINGFIELD — Illinois lawmakers will miss a self-imposed Friday deadline for approving a state budget amid dissension among Democrats, who control the governor’s office and both legislative chambers, over how to balance the ballooning cost of a health care program for immigrants with other party priorities.
Negotiations over a roughly $50 billion spending plan for the budget year that begins July 1 present the first major test of Gov. J.B. Pritzker’s second term after he won reelection last November by campaigning as a progressive who brought stability to the state’s chronically shaky finances.
As things stood late Thursday, it would not be procedurally possible for both chambers to approve a budget by the end of the day Friday, when the spring session was scheduled to adjourn. It wasn’t clear if legislators would work into the weekend or return to Springfield next week.
Tension was injected into what had been relatively drama-free budget talks when the Pritzker administration released new estimates that showed skyrocketing costs for an immigrant health care program that was created in 2020 but has twice been expanded, greatly enlarging the pool of eligible recipients.
The program provides Medicaid-style benefits for immigrants 42 and older who are in the country without legal permission or who have green cards but haven’t completed a five-year waiting period, and therefore don’t qualify for the traditional insurance program for the poor.
Pritzker’s February spending plan pegged the cost of the program at $220 million, but that figure has since swelled to $1.1 billion, according to the administration, though advocates and some lawmakers question that projection.
Some Democrats also are pushing to increase spending in other areas, including funding for elementary and high schools. There’s also pressure from new Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson to increase state support for the city’s effort to provide services to migrants arriving from the country’s southern border.
Pritzker’s top priority, meanwhile, has been a $250 million proposal to boost services for the state’s youngest residents and their families, including an expansion of state-funded preschool programs.
Complicating matters, tax revenue flowing into state coffers has begun to slow from the record levels seen last year, putting pressure on Pritzker, House Speaker Emanuel “Chris” Welch and Senate President Don Harmon to keep spending in check.
As of Thursday evening, the top three Democrats had not met in a week, though “significant progress was made during that meeting,” Pritzker spokesman Alex Gough said. Gough said the governor has had individual discussions with both leaders in the intervening days.
“Everyone is committed to passing a balanced budget and the governor understands that the legislature needs time to reach agreement,” Gough said.
Despite uncertainty over exactly when Democrats will reach a consensus, some lawmakers appeared optimistic a deal was within reach.
“We’re in reasonably good shape on the overall numbers, primarily because the governor’s budget proposal was very conservative,” said state Rep. Mark Walker of Arlington Heights, a member of the House Democrats’ budget negotiating team. “But we’re still negotiating whatever specific amount of money for every specific program is.”
“My expertise is in forecasting revenue, … and I’m pretty comfortable with that number,” Walker said.
Walker acknowledged, however, that national economic woes have created some uncertainty for the state’s budget picture.
“The economy is in somewhat of chaos in that people are doing things that are (unpredictable), and so no one knows where in this economy will settle down to its normal pace and how deep that turn back or recession will be or when it will be,” he said. “So, in the end, we’re all guessing, including all the economists.”
One of the biggest imperatives for lawmakers is making sure health care providers continue to operate “and continue to serve the families in the greatest need,” said Rep. Will Guzzardi of Chicago, another budget negotiator for the House Democrats.
“There’s ongoing discussions about increased reimbursement rates for Medicaid providers, for hospitals, for people, front-line workers who provide care for adults with developmental disabilities, making sure that we’re supporting those who care for the people in the greatest need in our state,” said Guzzardi, who also co-chairs the House Progressive Caucus. “I think that all parties recognize that there needs to be increases in some of these provider rates, but what the exact level of those increases will be is still being negotiated.”
Guzzardi said there have also been discussions on whether the state will pitch in with financial relief to help Mayor Johnson, a fellow progressive, address the influx of asylum-seekers to Chicago.
But he also pointed to a $200 million appropriation in the governor’s budget proposal that would provide support “both for new arrivals and for the existing homeless population,” which he said he’s optimistic will remain in the final budget.
The Medicaid-style program for undocumented immigrants is part of those negotiations, and Guzzardi said members of his caucus, as well as the Latino Caucus, “have taken a very clear stand that we won’t support any reduction in benefits to people who are currently covered by that program.”
Pritzker said last week that his administration had presented lawmakers with options to rein in the cost of the program, among them creating copays for some participants based on income and reexamining the reimbursement rates for health care providers serving those patients. It remains unclear which, if any, of those ideas lawmakers will embrace.
State Sen. Omar Aquino, a Chicago Democrat who’s sponsoring a measure that would expand the health care program’s coverage to adults 19 and older, said the law creating the program gave Pritzker’s Department of Healthcare and Family Services authority to make decisions on how it should operate.
“They’re going to end up making decisions that they believe (are) necessary to making sure that the program is running and thriving,” Aquino said. “But what I want to make sure is that people aren’t losing coverage, especially those that are currently in there, that they don’t see a reduction in services.”
While he’d like to see the expansion approved this year, Aquino acknowledged that “realistically, it’s probably one of those things that’s a more long-term goal.”
“Certainly, if we don’t do it this year, I’m going to be sponsoring the bill again next year and every year until we can … fill in that gap,” he said.
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State Sen. Elgie Sims of Chicago, the Senate Democrats’ budget point person, said Thursday afternoon that negotiations over how to address the roughly $880 million hole created by the immigrant health care program were “in a very good place,” though he declined to go into specifics.
Negotiators were still going through priorities of the various legislative caucuses and the governor, Sims said, characterizing it as part of the “normal budget process.”
Johnson’s request for more help with the influx of asylum-seekers in Chicago also is part of the conversation, though Sims couldn’t put a dollar figure on the new mayor’s request.
“I think they are still getting their arms wrapped around some of the estimates locally, including the additional influx of people from out of state, from Texas and Florida,” he said.
Overall, Sims said he expects a budget plan to be unveiled very soon in the legislature, though the timing depends on “the overall negotiations.”
As the budget negotiations continued this week, state officials also announced the reinstatement of a tax credit program that was put in place by Pritzker during his first year in office.
Dubbed the Blue Collar Jobs Act and administered by the Illinois Department of Commerce and Economic Opportunity, the program would provide tax credits for companies behind projects with certain levels of capital investment and job creation.
Pritzker had threatened to kill the program two years ago, angering Republicans because it was part of a budget and infrastructure deal some GOP lawmakers supported during the governor’s first year in office. It ultimately was spared and is just now being implemented.
Legislation continued to move through both chambers on Thursday. A measure that would allow those in the firearms industry to be sued for reasons that include failing to take steps to prevent illegal sales, such as straw purchases, or marketing guns for unlawful paramilitary use or for illegal use by anyone under 18, passed through the Senate in a 34-22 vote.
Opponents of the legislation, which was passed by the House earlier this month, have argued it violates federal law, which provides protections for firearms manufacturers against civil liabilities. A handful of Senate Democrats voted against the bill, which now heads to Pritzker, who has indicated his intention to sign it.
