Veteran state Rep. Deanne Mazzochi (R-Elmhurst) doesn’t hide her shock with the findings in a new University of Illinois at Chicago study that finds corruption costs state taxpayers a staggering $556 million annually.
“I’m surprised that the calculations are as small as they are,” Mazzochi told the Prairie State Wire. “Everyone knows economic growth in Illinois is hampered by corruption. If you’re a business owner faced with the choice of relocating to Illinois or Indiana, why wouldn’t you go to the other side of the border with all things being equal? Illinois would be leading the Midwest if not for such a bad ruling class.”
Since the turn of the millennium, researchers put the state’s corruption tab at well over $10 billion or in the neighborhood of $830 per resident.
In 2020 alone, at least four lawmakers in Springfield have already been indicted on federal corruption charges, adding yet another chapter to the state’s sordid history of having seen four governors jailed on corruption charges over the last five decades.
And then there is House Speaker Mike Madigan, the state’s longest-tenured lawmaker, who finds himself at the center of an ongoing federal probe involving utility giant ComEd and a pay-for-play scheme.
Mazzochi doesn’t see any of changes she feels are needed having any chance of coming to Springfield as long as Madigan remains at the helm.
“Everyone knows he needs to go,” she added. “Candidates make promises about being reform-minded but are not holding true to any of that. In the end, what will bring change is when the people of Illinois decide they’re sick and tired of all the corruption and they’re ready to stand up to it. You’ve got some Democratic lawmakers now willing to call out Madigan, but many of them are still taking his money.”
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