House Rep. Deanne Mazzochi (R-Elmhurst) says Gov J.B. Pritzker's emergency rules are unilateral threats and were not put through the proper channels before being implemented.
Mazzochi said Illinoisans did not consent to Pritzker's heavy-handed approach.
"The governor unilaterally decided to criminalize certain businesses," Mazzochi said. "He didn’t do it with a court order. He did not to it with a new law. He did it because that’s what he wants and just because he said so."
Mazzochi said Pritzker used COVID-19 as an excuse for his state agencies to make criminals out of business owners and their employees.
“If the governor wants to change the law, there is a process for that: go to the General Assembly and ultimately we, the people," Mazzochi said.
Mazzochi said Pritzker keeps concocting all these ways to deny people their rights with no due process while avoiding legislative accountability.
"He needs to stop with the unilateral threats and trying to use state agencies as his heavyweights," Mazzochi said.
Mazzochi said Illinoisans will decide if they need a new law and regulatory tracks are not the way to go about that.
"You don’t do it under the cover of darkness," Mazzochi said.
Mazzochi said the governor keeps saying his decisions are made by science and data, but his approach has made Illinois an extreme outlier from other states.
"What data, if it exists, does he have that other states don’t?" Mazzochi said. "Why does our governor want these same things shut down and our vulnerable not protected as they should be? This is not science and data. It’s gone beyond politics. This is arbitrary and abusive and needs to stop."
Mazzochi questioned who voted to weaponize business licenses and utility hookups, because it was not the General Assembly.
"Who voted to deny county sheriffs funding if they don’t do what governor wants? Not us," Mazzochi said. "This is a problem when you have a politically corrupt machine in Illinois. More of us are outside the machine than are in that are saying they see this and they want change."
Mazzochi said if the Joint Committee on Administrative Rules won't suspend these rules, then the General Assembly should.
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