Dupage Policy Journal

State Rep. Deanne Mazzochi (R-Elmhurst) argues Gov. J.B. Pritzker’s ongoing effort to remove a federal decree banning patronage hiring in the midst of a widening federal corruption probe reveals a lot about who he is.

“I think it shows a tin ear and he’s demonstrating that he wants to be a machine guy and not a reform governor,” Mazzochi told the DuPage Policy Journal. “If he wanted to focus on real reform, he would be concentrating on getting Mike Madigan out of office as House Speaker.”

Mazzochi is one of several GOP lawmakers now voicing concern about the fate of the Shakman Decrees that prohibit local lawmakers from controlling state government jobs. The decrees also created federal oversight of hiring practices in Springfield and Cook County. Even as Pritzker argues that the state is no longer in need of the nearly half-century old laws, Madigan finds himself at the center of a still evolving federal corruption probe targeting utility giant ComEd.

"To claim as the governor is that the state has made patronage a thing of the past is to laugh in the face of facts," Mazzochi told WGEM.com. "And it's to laugh in the face of hardworking taxpayers who pay for the cushy government jobs of cronies who don't deserve them. It doesn’t sit right that he wants to do away with Shakman with everything that we see going on.”

Mazzochi adds she’s convinced political gain should never have a say in government accountability and that Democrats are doing their constituents a disservice by not standing up to Madigan.

“Madigan is going to Madigan,” she said. “That’s why it’s so important that lawmakers’ stand up to him when it comes to doing what’s right for voters.”