Illinois Senate Republicans want Governor J.B. Pritzker to speed up the Restore Illinois plan. Wednesday, Senate Republicans sent a letter to the governor asking him to adopt a shorter timeline to move the state into Phase 4 of the plan. 50th District State Senator Steve McClure said that Pritzker’s marching with faith leaders in Chicago during a Black Lives Matter protest of the death of George Floyd was impetus for the letter.
McClure told WICS Newschannel 20 that he didn’t understand why families couldn’t go into restaurants with half capacity if the governor can mingle with hundreds of people in an area that’s been hit hard by COVID-19. In the letter, the Senate GOP asked the governor to adopt a 14-day timeline between phases rather than the current 28 days. If Pritzker would adopt the change, Phase 4 would start on Friday, June 12th instead of Friday, June 26th.
The governor is stood his ground on the matter yesterday: “In Illinois, what we’ve done the right way is rely upon the data, rely upon the science, rely upon the experts. You wouldn’t want political decisions being made here about public health. At the moment, the challenge that we have in the state is each time that you move from one phase to another is you need to take a measure of all that reopening and what’s the effect on hospitalizations, on cases, on deaths.”
McClure chided the governor for not following his own plan asking why he allowed the protest in Chicago to occur and why he didn’t social distance in the protest this week. The governor’s office has not responded to the direct inquiry about his participation in the protest on Monday which also included Congresswoman Robin Kelly, Cook County Board President Toni Preckwinkle, Cook County State’s Atty. Kim Foxx and Lt. Governor Juliana Stratton.