Thursday, Oct 30, 2025 – Posted by Isabel Miller

* Governor Pritzker was asked about the House transit bill during an unrelated press conference this morning…

Reporter: Governor, you met with Speaker Welch and President Harmon last night, was there any agreement to hold off on some of the revenues in the House transit bill?

Pritzker: It’s clear that both the Senate President and the Speaker and I want to come together around a bill that will work for the state of Illinois. Most importantly, for funding a world-class transit system. And so that’s what many discussions that took place yesterday were really all about. And there was progress there.

Reporter: Did you give them any guidance or leadership on what revenues you wouldn’t like not to be in the bill or to be in the bill?

Pritzker: Well, each of us had views that were brought to the table and put in the middle of the table and worked on together to make sure that there was an understanding about what could pass. That’s the important thing. In the end, you’ve got to get members of both chambers behind it. And to make sure that we can do it as expeditious of fashion as possible.

* On if the bill can get done during veto session…

Reporter: Governor, is the transit bill effectively dead now for the veto session in your mind?

Pritzker: The transit bill is not dead. I can tell you, there’s a whole lot of conversation and collaboration is still going on. And so the work is continuing.

Reporter: What about a special session? If it doesn’t happen now would that be called for that? And would you also include remapping?

Pritzker: We’re going to do what’s necessary to get a transit bill passed. We all understand how important to fund transit throughout the state of Illinois. And so we’re going to attempt to get it done ASAP.

* On what qualifies as a broad-base tax increase…

Reporter: In the spring, you said you wouldn’t support broad-base tax increases. Does that remain true to this day and include the transit bill?

Governor: When we talk about broad base, [there’s] pretty much three big broad-based taxes that exist in Illinois. That’s what I’m referring to when I talk about broad-base taxes. There’s individual income taxes, corporate income taxes and sales tax, right? That applies to the whole state. Those are the things that I think we should stay away from and indeed I’ve expressed that. And like I’ve said, everybody’s thrown on the table thinks it’s the best way to go about paying for a world class transit.

Reporter: So the RTA sales tax increase, is that off the table?

Pritzker: If you want to talk about that particularly, that is not a statewide broad-based tax. That isn’t something I talked about. I just spoke about three big buckets I said I’d like to avoid. There are lots of things that have been brought up, you’re asking about one in particular. There are really a lot of, a long list of ideas that have been put on the table and you’ve got to get some work. I realize that the Republicans don’t want to pay for anything and they would love to make everything world class but they think it doesn’t cost any money.

And so from my perspective no one likes to have to find revenue to pay for things, but it’s the only way you can actually get something done.