Wirepoints

30/07/2024

In what’s surely a painful, if only temporary, blow to his political ambitions, polls in the five major swing states show Gov. J.B. Pritzker ranks last as a VP choice for Kamala Harris.

Emerson College Polling/The Hill surveyed likely voters in Arizona, Georgia, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin and Michigan on July 22-23, with one of the questions being who should be considered for VP.

First, look at what registered Democrats had to say. In Arizona, Pritzker got just 0.2% of the vote. In Pennsylvania it was only slightly higher, at 0.5%. In Michigan, 1.1% and in Georgia, 2.4%.

Even in Wisconsin, where Gov. Pritzker has a vacation home and has spent millions on political campaigns, he still finished last with just 4.1% of the votes.

The polling outcome is brutal for the Illinois governor.

In what’s surely a painful, if only temporary, blow to his political ambitions, polls in the five major swing states show Gov. J.B. Pritzker ranks last as a VP choice for Kamala Harris.

29/07/2024

A panel convened last week in Michigan discussed growing problems for Gotion’s electric vehicle battery factory plans for Manteno, Illinois and Green Charter Township, Michigan. Gotion is the Chinese company tied to the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), slated to receive over $8 billion in state and federal subsidies for its Manteno project.

With risks to the project multiplying, an obvious question is why Gotion would press ahead.

Why would Gotion plow ahead in the face of so many threats to its Manteno project? Here’s one good reason: Gotion is playing with the house’s money.

23/07/2024

Here’s something you don’t see every day: An Illinois Democratic officeholder defying the prevailing policy that puts illegal immigrants first.

He’s Rep. Anthony DeLuca of south suburban Chicago Heights. His area is now facing exceptionally crushing property tax increases ranging from 26% to over 100%.

DeLuca says the state should redirect money slated for migrants to property tax relief for working class homeowners in the south suburbs. “State dollars previously dedicated to management of the migrant crisis should now be turned to a growing property tax crisis affecting residents in the south suburbs,” DeLuca says, as quoted in the Southland Journal.

Here's something you don't see every day: An Illinois Democratic officeholder defying the prevailing policy putting illegal immigrants first.

22/07/2024

Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson is catching a lot of flack for demanding that Chicago Public Schools borrow hundreds of millions to pay for a hole in the budget and the coming raises of his fellow Chicago Teachers Union members.

CPS faces a minimum $500 million deficit in the coming year and it’s expected to get even bigger once a new teachers contract is negotiated. CPS is stretched thin now that federal covid funds are running out, but rather than cut costs, Johnson wants to tap the bond market for $300 million and push the school district deeper into debt.

Did Johnson’s closest advisors forget to tell him that CPS is already junk rated, the only one among the nation’s 15 largest school districts?












Chicago Mayor's Office

Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson wants to tap the bond market for $300 million and push CPS deeper into debt. Did his closest advisors forget to tell him that CPS is already junk rated, the only one among the nation’s 15 largest school districts?

22/07/2024

The Democratic National Convention is coming to Chicago next month. The eyes of the nation will be on our city and state.

What will they see? You can be sure Chicago and all Illinois will be held up by the political establishment as showcases of progressive policy success.

But who has the facts, data and analysis to help expose what’s really happening here? Wirepoints does.

Straight talk, facts and data are what we’re known for, and we’ll be working harder than ever to make it all available to national media and anybody else looking for the whole picture. We’ve already set up a special DNC Chicago page on our site that contains some of our best work.

Help us get the word out!

The Democratic National Convention is coming to Chicago next month. You can be sure Chicago and all of Illinois will be held up by the political establishment as showcases of the success of progressive policies. But who has the facts, data and analysis to help expose what's really happening here? Wi...

19/07/2024

South Cook residents are right to be irate about their sky-high property tax hikes, where residents in the worst-off cities saw tax bills more than double in just one year. The median Dixmoor tax bill jumped up by 122% this year. In Phoenix it more than doubled, up 107%. And in Harvey the median bill increased by 82%. We show in the appendix below the 15 cities in Southland with the biggest jumps.

What’s worse is how that money is being squandered. Education is the biggest expense on a resident’s tax bill and a look at the top-paid school administrators across the Southland area shows dozens of officials getting paid big bucks to deliver distressing educational outcomes.

Top of the list is Dolton SD 148’s Superintendent Kevin Nohelty. He’s compensated with nearly $480,000 a year to manage a district where just 14% of black students can read at grade level. Dolton’s assistant superintendent Sonya Whitaker receives total compensation of $310,000. (Amazingly, Dolton spends $25,000 per student, 97% of its teachers are rated excellent or proficient, and 8 of the 9 schools in the district are rated “commendable,” the state’s second-best school rating.)

Thornton Twp HSD 205’s Nathaniel Cunningham gets total compensation of $310,000 a year to deliver 7% black student reading proficiency. Just 5% are proficient in math. Yet the district goes ahead and graduates 82% of its students anyway. (Thornton spends, all-in, $29,000 per year, 100% of its teachers are rated “excellent or proficient,” and all three schools are rated “commendable.”)

We lay out online the top 25 paid administrators from cities with the biggest tax hike increases.

South Cook residents are right to be irate about their sky-high property tax hikes, where residents in the worst-off cities saw tax bills more than double in just one year. What’s worse is how that money is being squandered. A look at the top-paid school administrators across the Southland area sh...

16/07/2024

“Violence is never the answer in our democracy,” wrote countless Illinois officials on Sunday, including Gov. JB Pritzker, about the assassination attempt on Donald Trump. Particularly significant, for reasons you will see, is Rep. Jan Schakowsky, who wrote on Sunday, “Political violence has no place in our democracy and I wholeheartedly condemn it.”

Where were such voices when the precedent was set – when political violence against the Trump campaign first got the green light?

The date is clear. It was early in Trump’s first campaign – March 11, 2016.

That’s when a concerted effort by Democratic party operatives to incite violence succeeded in causing cancellation of a Trump rally planned for that night at the University of Illinois in Chicago. Video evidence of that effort is clear. A former federal prosecutor said the tape is “absolutely prima facie evidence of criminal activity” — both federal and state criminal laws.













Governor JB Pritzker
Chicago Mayor's Office
Jan Schakowsky

For those now saying there's no place in democracy for political violence, the hypocrisy is shameless.

12/07/2024

New statistics from a recently released report by the state’s official financial analysts detailed just how poorly Illinois’ economy since 2019 ranks compared to the rest of the nation: 4th-worst for economic growth; 6th-worst for job growth; 6th-worst for unemployment; and 5th-worst for income growth.

Not that it matters to Illinois lawmakers, who have hiked their salary several times over the last three years. As of July 1st they pay themselves a base $93,712 a year, before stipends and other allowances push the total well above $100,000. It’s the 4th-highest base pay of any state legislator in the country. Only politicians in New York ($142,000), California ($122,694) and Pennsylvania ($102,844) pay themselves more.

10/07/2024

Illinois lawmakers continue to reward themselves handsomely for failure. Illinois ranks among the worst nationally on a host of financial, economic and taxation metrics, and yet the same lawmakers that put Illinois in that position keep hiking their own pay, pushing their total compensation well above $100,000 for what is effectively part-time work.

New statistics from a recently released report by the state’s official financial analysts detailed just how poorly Illinois’ economy since 2019 ranks compared to the rest of the nation: 4th-worst for economic growth; 5th-worst for job growth; 5th-worst for unemployment; and 4th worst for income growth.

Not that it matters to Illinois lawmakers, who have hiked their salary several times over the last three years. As of July 1st they pay themselves a base $93,712 a year, before stipends and other allowances push the total well above $100,000. It’s the 4th-highest base pay of any state legislator in the country. Only politicians in New York ($142,000), California ($122,694) and Pennsylvania ($102,844) pay themselves more.

Illinois lawmakers continue to reward themselves handsomely for failure. Illinois ranks among the worst nationally on a host of financial, economic and taxation metrics, and yet the same lawmakers that put Illinois in that position keep hiking their own pay, pushing their total compensation well abo...

09/07/2024

Chicago had over 100 shootings during the extended Independence Day weekend. Commenting on that, Mayor Johnson had a new person to blame: Richard Nixon. Johnson said, “Black death has unfortunately been accepted in this country for far too long. And we had a chance 60y ago to fix that and people mocked President (Lyndon B) Johnson. And we got Nixon.”

That’s from Chicago Tribune reporter Alice Yin on X.

Nixon left office almost exactly 50 years ago.











Chicago Mayor's Office

Nixon left office almost exactly 50 years ago.

09/07/2024

If you think Illinois’ problems only amount to Illinois voters getting what they deserve, you are mistaken. A new report says Illinois, with the fifth largest state economy in the nation, is helping pull the country down.

It should come as no surprise, therefore, that other new reports continue to show that Illinois is a “net taker” in terms of its balance of payments with the federal government. Five years ago, Illinois gave up its long-held claim that it sends the federal government more than it gets in return, and that “net taker” status continues today.

Succinct evidence of Illinois’ underperformance is in the June report by COGFA, Illinois’ bipartisan Commission on Government Forecasting and Accountability.

The results are damning for Illinois by all four measures, with the state ranking from 45th to 47th on each among the states.












Governor JB Pritzker

Schadenfreude feels nice when you think about Illinois voters who elected the people responsible for this, but know that Illinois’ problems are also America’s problems.

08/07/2024

Gov. J.B. Pritzker told America last week on a CNN interview that President Biden has “…done a lot to revive American manufacturing. In my state, you know, we’ve seen jobs and companies coming back to the United States and to Illinois.”

But the governor’s comment about Illinois is simply not true – not when you measure it by the number of Illinoisans who are actually employed. Fewer people are on Illinois’ employment rolls today than when Gov. Pritzker took office.*

Back then, in 2019, Illinois employed 6,273,060 workers, according to the BLS’ Local Area Unemployment Statistics Program. Based on the latest numbers, only 6,193,823 are employed today. That’s a loss of 80,000 working Illinoisans during the governor’s tenure.

It’s also the nation’s 3rd-worst performance over that 5-year span. Only California and New York suffered bigger losses in employment than Illinois did.











Governor JB Pritzker

Gov. J.B. Pritzker told America last week on a CNN interview that President Biden has “...done a lot to revive American manufacturing. In my state, you know, we've seen jobs and companies coming back to the United States and to Illinois." But the governor’s comment about Illinois is simply not t...

03/07/2024

Wirepoints recently warned in a Chicago Sun-Times oped that Chicago’s pension mess was going to get worse. As Chicago’s latest annual financial report shows, that’s just what happened.

Chicago’s pension shortfall across the city’s four major retirement funds – Municipal, Laborers, Police and Fire – rose to $37.2 billion total in 2023. That’s a 5% increase from $35.4 billion reported the prior year. Most of the increase is attributed to changes in actuarial assumptions and recent legislation that sweetened the cost-of-living pension benefit for thousands of police and firefighters.

Add in the Teachers Pension Fund’s $15.8 billion shortfall and Chicagoans are on the hook for $53 billion in unfunded pension liabilities. That’s over $45,000 owed per Chicago household to be paid off over time.












Chicago Mayor's Office

Wirepoints recently warned in a Chicago Sun-Times oped that Chicago’s pension mess was going to get worse. As Chicago’s latest annual financial report shows, that’s just what happened.

02/07/2024

When even progressive Greg Hinz at Crain’s Chicago Business writes about the specter of a “tax revolt,” you know a crisis has been ignored far too long. New tax bills are now on the way to Cook County property owners.

The shock will be devastating for many. Details are in the 2023 Tax Year Bill Analysis released last week by Cook County Treasurer Maria Pappas.

Staggering increases are concentrated in the south and southwest suburbs (those south of North Avenue). There, the median residential bill jumped by 19.9%, to $6,117.

Most stunning of all, in 15 south suburbs, 13 of which have majority black populations, median tax bills are jumping by anywhere from 26% to 122%.

The shock will be devastating for many. In the south and southwest suburbs, the median residential bill jumped by 19.9%, to $6,117. For other south suburbs, the jump is far more.

01/07/2024

There’s something telling about what Gov. JB Pritzker wrote during Thursday’s presidential debate that’s utterly disheartening, and it’s about more than Pritzker.

Instead of criticizing Donald Trump with honesty and facts — material for which is abundant — Pritzker chose to repeat a lie. More importantly, it’s a lie widely known and easily shown to be a lie, as Pritzker surely knows.

Pritzker wrote on X, “When neo N***s marched on Charlottesville chanting ‘Jews will not replace us’, Donald Trump called them very fine people. And now he says it’s all a lie. It’s not a lie, Donald Trump is just a liar.”

That claim has been thoroughly debunked over and over again by sources on both the left and right. When Trump said “very fine people on both sides” he specifically noted that he was not talking about neo-N***s and white supremacists and said they should be “condemned totally.”

The video is available. It can’t be more clear that he wasn’t talking about neo-N***s.













Governor JB Pritzker

Maybe the reason is in what pollster Scott Rasmussen calls "the most terrifying poll result I have ever seen."

01/07/2024

The latest state-to-state migration numbers from the Internal Revenue Service confirm what Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker consistently denies: Illinois is bleeding people.

IRS data for the 2022 tax filing year released last week shows Illinois once again lost out in the battle for Americans as they migrate between states each year. In all, Illinois netted a loss of 87,000 residents, with 175,000 moving into Illinois from other states and 262,000 moving out. That loss was the third-largest in the country, with only California and New York netting bigger losses of residents. Wirepoints documented in detail last week who were the nation’s biggest winners and losers overall.

Not only did Illinois lose a net 87,000 residents, but the state also lost the incomes those residents took with them. Illinois gave up a net $9.8 billion in Adjusted Gross Incomes (AGI), with outgoing residents taking with them more than $19.3 billion in AGI, while those moving in only brought in $9.5 billion. The net loss of AGI was also the nation’s third largest.

In all, Illinois lost residents, on net, to 40 states, giving up a total 87,877 residents, while it netted a tiny gain of 632 residents from 7 states. Illinois broke even with Hawaii and Nebraska.

Illinois' population and outmigration losses keep piling up. The latest, freshest IRS data for tax filing year 2022 shows Illinois netted a loss of 87,000 residents to other states. And they took more than $10 billion in AGI with them. Illinois went zero for six vs. its neighboring states and lost p...

28/06/2024

Illinois, New York and California continued their streak as the nation’s biggest losers of residents and their wealth to other states, according to a Wirepoints analysis of newly-released 2022 Filing Year Internal Revenue Service (IRS) migration data.

North Carolina, Texas and Florida remained the nation’s big winners.

Florida, the nation’s usual winner, gained the most net people, 245,000, and the most net Adjusted Gross Income (AGI), $36 billion. Texas followed with a net gain of 181,000 people and $10.1 billion in AGI. North Carolina was in third with a gain of nearly 83,00 people and $4.6 billion in AGI.

In contrast, states like California, New York and Illinois once again experienced the nation’s biggest losses. California lost more people than any other state, with 307,000 net movers taking $23.8 billion to other states.

New York lost a net of more than 222,000 people and $14.1 billion, while Illinois bled 87,000 net residents and $9.8 billion.












Governor JB Pritzker
Gov Ron DeSantis

If America’s big states are any indication, it’s the better managed, less expensive states that are winning out over the government-centric, high-cost states. Illinois, New York and California continued their streak as the nation’s biggest losers of residents and their wealth to other states. ...

27/06/2024

NBC Chicago reported Monday that the Chicago Police Department told it, for the August Democratic National Convention, “vandalism and violence of any kind will not be tolerated” and, “Those who continue to be in violation of dispersal orders after a reasonable amount of time will face arrest.”

Wouldn’t it have been nice if such a policy had applied to the 2020 rioters in Chicago?

The same dual justice system was announced by Cook County States Attorney Kim Foxx a couple months ago, though few noticed. For four years, the public policy of the Cook County state’s attorney’s office has been not to prosecute criminal violations tied to protests and demonstrations if the office deems those actions “peaceful.”

But Foxx told The Chicago Tribune in April that her office’s policy on protests won’t be in effect for the convention. A Tribune editorial commendably called out the unequal justice, writing that the policy should be scrapped not just for the convention but for everything. Equality under law obviously demands that.

Most lawbreaking was fine when protests purported to be about George Floyd in 2020, but when they are directed at a Democratic convention, well, we can’t have any of that, right?

Most lawbreaking was fine when protests purported to be about George Floyd in 2020, but when they are directed at a Democratic convention, well, we can't have any of that, right?

26/06/2024

Chicago’s summer carnage. The whole thing is ugly and cold. It feels cheap to expose the details. But murder and trauma is the harsh reality of what’s happening in the city, where local and state leaders have abandoned black victims in favor of black criminals. All the talk of “equity” and “social justice” and “investment” is cheap and worthless. Those “actions” are only resulting in more crime and even more victims. No matter what you hear, Chicago violent crimes are at their highest point since 2019.

Last weekend, June 14-16, 71 people were shot and 9 killed. Eight of those murdered were black. One was Latino. And nine of every 10 people shot were minorities. Most of the shootings and murders were in the South and West Side neighborhoods. That means most of crimes will get totally ignored.

It also means nothing will change – not under the current city and state leadership.

The CPD will be handcuffed by the same rules that prevent real policing. Lawbreakers will still demonstrate the same disrespect for law and order. And criminals will still be protected as if they were the actual victims.

Read more: https://wirepoints.org/one-june-weekend-in-chicago-71-shot-9-dead-wirepoints/

Chicago’s carnage last weekend. It’s ugly and cold. But it’s the harsh reality of what’s happening in the Windy City. This past weekend (June 14-16) more than 71 people were shot and 9 people killed. Most of the shootings and murders were in neighborhoods on the South and West Side. That mea...

26/06/2024

In Chicago in 2023, more than 1,800 calls were made to 911 of a person being shot. Only about 800 – fewer than half – were responded to immediately by police officers. The other 1,000 callers were victims of 911 backlogs, where no police were available at the time of the call. Those victims had to wait half an hour, an hour, or even several hours for the 911 call backlog to end and for police to finally arrive.

It was the same for the 32,000 911 calls of an assault in progress, where police were only immediately available for 50% of those calls. And it was the same for 54% of the city’s 911 calls of 35,000 batteries in progress.

In all, there were 783,000 high-priority 911 calls in 2023. For 437,000 of those calls, or 56%, long periods of backlogs meant there were no police immediately available. Wirepoints obtained the 911 call and response data directly from the Chicago Police Department via FOIA.

The fact that it’s essentially a 50/50 chance as to whether officers show up promptly for a violent crime should be horrifying to the residents of Chicago.

When Chicagoans call 911, there’s a 50/50 chance there'll be no cops available to help. Of the 256,000 high-priority 911 calls made so far in 2024, nearly 127,000 had no police available to immediately respond. The fact that victims of violent crime are essentially flipping a coin as to whether of...

26/06/2024

The number of administrators in Illinois schools has jumped by 70% in the last 15 years, while student enrollment has fallen by 5 percent (see appendix). That bloat has contributed to the nation-high property taxes Illinoisans pay and it also sucks up resources that could go directly to classrooms.

What does that bloat look like? When we ranked the number of students per administrator for Chicagoland-area unit school districts – those with both elementary and high schools – Lisle CUSD 202 was the worst (least efficient) with a student-to-admin ratio of just 77. That’s half the statewide ratio of 141 students per administrator.

By comparison, the best third of Illinois’ 300 Chicago-area school districts average 170 students per administrator. And the top 20 most efficient districts have more than 200 students per admin. The data all comes straight from the Illinois State Board of Education’s Illinois Report Card.

We got a call recently from a resident in Lisle who insisted his school district, Lisle CUSD 202, was bloated with administrators. The numbers show he’s right about Lisle. But it's also true for the entire state. The number of administrators in Illinois schools has jumped by 70% in the last 15 yea...

25/06/2024

When we’ve warned recently about the dangers of a “Doom Loop” for Chicago and other cities because of empty offices space, we’ve cited the Lincoln Institute of Land Policy study that shows Chicago has the highest commercial property taxes in the country. Those taxes are one of several pressure points – including an ongoing crime wave, faltering public transportation, a failing school district, not to mention the continued impacts of working from home – that threaten to send the city into a downward spiral.

Now another tax study, this one by the Altus Group, shows the same: Chicago has the highest effective commercial property tax rate among some of the nation’s biggest cities. Altus Group is a provider of asset and fund intelligence for commercial real estate.

Chicago’s effective property tax rate for commercial properties is 5.37%, the highest by far. New York City came in 2nd-worst at 4.79%. The other eight major cities cited in the study have commercial property tax rates dramatically lower than Chicago’s. In fact, Chicago’s tax rate is over four times greater than San Francisco, Los Angeles, and Nashville’s.

Read more: https://wirepoints.org/new-property-tax-study-chicagos-commercial-property-tax-rates-dwarf-those-of-other-major-cities-wirepoints/

Chicago has the highest effective commercial property tax rate among some of the nation’s biggest cities. Those taxes are one of several pressure points – including an ongoing crime wave, faltering public transportation, a failing school district, not to mention the continued impacts of working ...