Gov. JB Pritzker is pictured at his second-term inauguration on Monday, Jan. 9 in Springfield. (Capitol Information Illinois picture by Jerry Nowicki)
Governor touts accomplishments from vitality and infrastructure to assault weapons ban
By NIKA SCHOONOVER
Capitol Information Illinois
nschoonover@capitolnewsillinois.com
SPRINGFIELD – After his second-term inauguration amid a frenzied “lame duck” legislative session final week, Gov. JB Pritzker took the worldwide stage this week on the World Financial Discussion board’s annual assembly in Davos, Switzerland.
The governor and high-ranking members of his workers joined a bipartisan delegation of U.S. politicians and world enterprise leaders with the objective of “selling Illinois as a serious participant on the world stage,” Pritzker mentioned in a name Thursday morning with media shops again residence.
Particularly, Pritzker touted Illinois’ Local weather and Equitable Jobs Act, or CEJA – which goals to make Illinois’ vitality grid reliant on one hundred pc renewable sources by 2050 – and the $45 billion capital infrastructure plan generally known as Rebuild Illinois.
“We’ve made it very clear when in search of nation-leading laws, and management on preventing local weather change and clear vitality developments, that you just don’t must cease on the coastal states,” Pritzker added.
CEJA additionally set a objective of getting a million electrical automobiles on Illinois roads by 2030. The state is climbing steadily towards that objective, with the variety of electrical automobiles registered within the state rising from 8,255 to 57,311 over the previous 5 years.
A latest report from the union-tied Illinois Financial Coverage Institute famous that a rise to 1 million EVs by 2030 might doubtlessly trigger a lower in state and federal transportation revenues exceeding $1 billion over the following decade.
Since transportation infrastructure revenues are closely reliant on motor gasoline taxes, the income loss might attain $4.3 billion when factoring in elevated gasoline effectivity, the report famous.
When requested if he had a plan for making up the misplaced income, Pritzker mentioned he didn’t discover something within the report “uncommon” and the state continues to encourage EV adoption by means of tax credit.
“It’s not like Illinois is doing one thing that’s deleterious to the way forward for infrastructure funding that is not already occurring all throughout the nation,” he mentioned, with out figuring out different potential income sources.
Pritzker mentioned he has additionally been assembly with enterprise and world leaders to debate bringing extra enterprise to Illinois. Particularly, he cited the sector of hydrogen vitality as a possible space of development in Illinois.
On Tuesday, Pritzker visited the Wieland manufacturing facility in Vöhringen, Germany, an business chief in manufacturing and changing copper and copper alloys.
Wieland presently has eight areas in Illinois, together with in East Alton the place the governor not too long ago visited.
“I needed to ensure they know that I’m at their service if there are issues that I can do to boost their operations,” Pritzker mentioned. “They’ve many different divisions…and so bringing extra of the remainder of their firm to Illinois is a chance I’d prefer to benefit from.”
In a information launch, Wieland CEO Erwin Mayer mentioned the corporate is “contributing to the revitalization of producing in the united statesA. and serving the essential industries within the fields of semiconductors and electrical automobiles.”
“We sit up for persevering with the collaboration with Gov. Pritzker and his administration on additional growing these essential provide chains,” he mentioned within the launch.
On Wednesday evening, Pritzker mentioned, he had dinner with the U.S. ambassador to Switzerland and the Swiss ambassador to the U.S., discussing potential enterprise relationships.
The governor has additionally been touting two legal guidelines he signed final week: a ban on the state’s assault weapons and a measure defending abortion suppliers and out-of-state sufferers, in addition to gender-affirming care.
“In my state, individuals need to ban assault weapons. We simply did that. Shield a girl’s proper to decide on. We simply did that,” Pritzker mentioned throughout a broadly reported panel dialogue Tuesday. “These should not occurring on the federal degree and may, however we’re doing it on the state degree.”
Pritzker talked about these measures within the media name Thursday whereas referring to himself because the “state’s greatest chief advertising officer.”
“I’m ensuring that folks find out about our management on safeguarding reproductive rights, on our concentrate on fiscal accountability, our booming manufacturing sector and the truth that we’re filled with sensible expertise from our world-class universities and our nation-leading, third largest within the nation group school system.”
The governor additionally downplayed a Thursday morning POLITICO report that he was overheard speaking at “excessive quantity within the central lounge of the Congress Middle” about his potential for a White Home bid. He mentioned the dialogue that was overheard was with a reporter, to whom he was giving the identical reply he often offers to native media shops.
“I’ve each intention to serve out the 4 years that I simply received as governor,” he mentioned. “We’ve a whole lot of challenges in Illinois that we’re going to proceed to work on overcoming and plenty of success already.”
Pritzker was accompanied by first girl MK Pritzker, chief of workers Anne Caprara, and deputy governors Andy Manar and Christian Mitchell. He didn’t present a value breakdown, however mentioned “a lot of it’s lined by me personally.”
“And, in fact there is a safety want, in order that’s lined by the state of Illinois,” he mentioned.
Capitol Information Illinois is a nonprofit, nonpartisan information service protecting state authorities. It’s distributed to greater than 400 newspapers statewide, in addition to a whole lot of radio and TV stations. It’s funded primarily by the Illinois Press Basis and the Robert R. McCormick Basis.
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