Government unions pour $4 million into ads for Amendment 1

Government worker unions are funding advertisements for a constitutional amendment that would guarantee $2,100 average property tax hikes statewide.

Some of the same groups that supported taxing retirement income and doubling the gas tax are now pushing a constitutional amendment guaranteeing $2,100 in higher property taxes for Illinoisans.

A political action committee backed by unions has poured $4 million into media buys pushing for Amendment 1.

Innocuously dubbed a “workers’ rights amendment,” in reality Amendment 1 gives public union leaders greater powers backed by the weight of the Illinois Constitution. Any government union contract would carry the weight of the state constitution, potentially overring state law.

No other state hands that kind of power to public union bosses.

If passed, Amendment 1 would guarantee an additional $2,100 in property taxes for the average Illinois family. Illinois homeowners already pay the second-highest average property taxes in the nation.

The American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, the largest state worker union in Illinois, is also putting money towards the amendment. AFSCME has donated $100,000 to the same PAC.

They were one of many unions that supported doubling Illinois’ gas tax, which is now the second-highest in the nation.

One of Amendment 1’s sponsors, former state Sen. Thomas Cullerton, is waiting to start a one-year sentence in federal prison for embezzling from a no-work union job.

Voters will have a choice about approving Amendment 1, but once it’s written into the state constitution they will have little choice about repealing it or changing any of its implications.

Illinoisans on average paid an additional $1,913 in property taxes since Gov. J.B Pritzker took office. Voters will decide Nov. 8 whether property taxes will be even higher.