When asked if the state would consider a supplemental appropriation to cover costs for migrants, Gov. J.B. Pritzker says Illinois government will continue to use taxpayer-funded programs already budgeted.

Chicago has seen at least 15,000 non-citizen arrivals sent to Chicago after crossing the U.S. southern border. The city and state have already spent hundreds of millions of dollars to care for the newly arrived migrants.

When COVID-19 struck in 2020, the government quickly put together massive aid programs to help struggling businesses, along with the people who lost their jobs.

But other kinds of enterprises with names like the Traveling Vice Lords and the Wild 100s — criminal street gangs in Chicago and across the country — soon figured out how to take advantage of that safety net. They defrauded those programs of millions of dollars that they used to buy guns and drugs, according to the U.S. Justice Department and court records.

Chicago became the largest U.S. city to independently phase out the subminimum wage for tipped workers on Friday, a step celebrity chef Rick Bayless said the city needed to take “for the greater good.”

Bayless supported the legislation, which passed by vote of 36-10, but not without reservations.

President of the United Auto Workers (UAW) Shawn Fain was in Chicago Saturday to rally with workers on strike at the Ford plant on the city’s South Side.

Mayor Brandon Johnson and city leaders joined Fain and striking members of the UAW Local 551 at the Ford Plant on Torrence Avenue where the union president encouraged them to keep going until their demands are met.

The expanding array of wagering opportunities in Illinois created the state’s largest windfall to date from gambling-related taxes during the last fiscal year.

The Illinois legislature’s Commission on Government Forecasting and Accountability’s recently released annual “Wagering in Illinois” report shows the state’s gambling taxes from lottery sales, casinos, horse racing, sports betting and video gambling climbed to $1.99 billion in the fiscal year that ended June 30, a 5.1% increase from the previous fiscal year.

Mayor Brandon Johnson’s decision to bring a NASCAR road race back downtown comes even though the event this past 4th of July weekend generated less economic impact than predicted and cost the city at least $3.5 million for police overtime and construction.

The $3.5 million figure stands in contrast to the $620,000 NASCAR paid the city to transform streets surrounding Grant Park into a 12-turn, 2.2-mile racetrack. NASCAR paid a base $500,000 permit fee to the Chicago Park District in April and in late September cut a final check for the 2023 race for nearly $120,000 to pay the city its portion of ticket sales as well as commissions for food, beverage and merchandise, according to city records.

Approximately $156 million in relief funds are coming to Illinois as the last of the Back to Business program money comes in according to the Illinois Department of Commerce and Economic Opportunity (DCEO).

Nearly 4,000 grants went to businesses in over 500 cities in 95 counties across Illinois.