Illinois secession push grows as downstate counties voice frustration with Chicago

Hey, welcome back to Good Day Chicago. Natalie and Tia here with you on your Friday morning. Get this. Maybe this was not a choice that we had here in the Chicagoland area, but it was on some ballots downstate. Now we know nearly half of the state's counties have voted to separate from Cook County and Chicago. In this latest election, on average, 80% of the voters polled said they don't want anything to do with Chicagoland. Yeah, this raises new questions about the growing divide between Chicago and downstate communities. The polling is non-binding, but it shows Illinois legislators have a lot of work to do to really unite other folks across the state, not just people in Cook County, right? Joining us now is Erin Del Mar, former Republican candidate For Lieutenant Governor, thank you so much for spending some time with us this morning. Well, good morning. Thank you so much for having me. Let's start with this part. You're obviously from the Chicago area. When you traveled downstate and you spoke to voters, what was their biggest complaint about Cook County? Well, probably I would say there's two biggest issues. Number one is the lack of representation because Cook County and Chicago have such a densely populated area. The representation in Springfield is just not well dispersed. And so they feel like they've not been heard. They feel like they've been ignored. They feel like there's been a ton of disinvestment in their communities. And gas tax here in Illinois hits a lot harder when your grocery store is about 45 minutes away Oh, wow. And that is it really is a good point. And, you know, I mentioned yesterday we've got Governor Pritzker talking about making Illinois more affordable for its residents, yet he doubled the gas tax. It went from 19 cents to about 38 cents during his first two terms in office. That is a good point. Over the last couple of years, Erin, 40 out of Illinois' 102 counties have voted to secede from the state. What is the likelihood of that happening? Well, I don't think it's gonna happen at all. But going back to a quick thing that you mentioned, that gas tax. In rural parts of Illinois, most Illinoisans don't know that half that money leaves their community and goes up to the RTA to pay for the failed transit system in Chicago. So when they're paying that high gas tax at the pump, that money is not even staying in their communities. But back to your other question, no, I don't think it's reasonable to see these counties leave. And I think that's unfortunate for them, because they wanna have their voice heard. But it would take Both the legislature and the Senate in Illinois, as well as the governor, to approve these 44 counties to leave. I have been talking to a lot of my friends in the rural parts in southern Illinois, south of I-80. And I would expect in the next cycle, there's going to be another 15 to 20 more counties that are going to put this referendum, which again, is non-binding, on the ballot for 27. Erin, I know obviously you heard from downstate voters on this saying that Chicago has, you know, way too much influence. But what would separating from Chicago and Cook County actually fix for those families if it did happen? And can you point to a specific way it would lower their taxes or maybe even improve some of the services that they actually rely on? Well, I think the first part is that one of the challenges that Springfield has is you can't govern 102 counties of Illinois like they're all Cook County. The rural parts of the state have different priorities. They have different concerns. It is really a bigger, different way of living. To go into the economic scale of it, I don't know if you, in the research that I've done, if the 44 counties, and even if they got another 10 counties to leave, the economic viability of that probably wouldn't make a whole lot of sense because they don't have all of the different resources in order to have a state government. I know that Indiana passed legislation to accept them into their state, but I just don't see that as being feasible either. In a lot of parts of Illinois, especially in Cook County, for every dollar you spend in taxes, you get about 87 cents in services. In the rural parts of the state, for every dollar they spend as far as their income tax goes, they're getting anywhere from $1.7, and real rural parts of the state are getting up to $2. So there is not an equitable divide as far as where their tax dollars are going, but I think the bigger issue is having their voice heard, having their concerns heard, and having a level of respect that they are part of Illinois. I think they really don't want to leave Illinois, they just want to make sure that they're part of Illinois and their voices are heard. I wanna go back to this point, okay, so let's say this did happen. They did leave the state of Illinois, would people in Cook County actually feel their departure? And if so, in what ways? Well, from the economic standpoint of the local share that comes out of our income tax, people in Cook County would actually get a boost because they spend more money in the rural parts of the state than what Cook County residents are getting. So there would be a small adjustment of having more dollars to be spent in another part of the state. As far as the pride of Illinois, the pride of being a consolidated 102-county state and all united, I think there would be some heartbreak there because- The second people in Cook County, and I was one of them, I never really understood when people were saying you're going to Southern Illinois, I thought they were talking about Schaumburg or Kankakee. But there's so much rural areas in Illinois, 74% by geography of Illinois is farmland and agriculture. And most people don't realize that we're very important to the nation's food security. And when you have food security, you have national security. But there is a pride of being in Illinois. But I don't think- That Southern Illinois really is having that right now. That's why you see these referendums. I think it's a wake up call for Springfield to say, hey, look, We're hurting, we're not being heard, we're having challenges, and I think they should listen to it. You can't rebuild and grow Illinois if you're not listening to all 102 counties. And I think the very ironic part of this is I grew up downstate in Springfield. And Springfield, even though the state legislature meets there, the majority of the state legislature from Chicago, the governor from Chicago, most of the people in Springfield feel the same way as those people in the 44 counties that voted to secede from the state. So that's interesting. On this, I think we've got a little more time, Aaron. You obviously ran with Republican gubernatorial candidate Darren Bailey as his lieutenant governor. You guys lost. He lost for a second time, you for the first. But how do you make the Republican agenda resonate with Illinoisans? Because Democrats had a super majority in the House and Senate, and that continues. So is there even a chance or an opportunity for Republicans to get any type of power back in Under the current circumstances of political climate, the answer is no. I mean, the Illinois Republican Party and Republican Party pretty much across the United States right now has been burnt to a crisp. We lost races on Tuesday that weren't even on the radar to be considered challenging. I think the Illinois Republican Party for itself needs to have a full reset. I think we need a new Illinois Convention for the Republican Party. I think we need to do it sooner than later. I think we need to change our platform and start talking about issues that matter to people at the kitchen table. We need to start talking to people about what we stand for and not just what we're against. And we really need to take a hard look at how we can grow out of this. You can't paint a door after the house has been burned down and think something's changed. You have to have a new foundation. And I'm one of the people that are telling the leadership in the party, What we've been doing, it's not just this cycle, what we've been doing for the last decade and a half isn't working. And so it doesn't need to be reformed, it needs a full remodel and a full rebuild. Aaron, I gotta ask you something to back that up. Because when we talk about this, the Republican side of things, you can't- Also not talk about the current president, and we're talking about Donald Trump. And in some cases, people believe candidates, maybe like Darren Bailey, didn't separate themselves enough from Donald Trump. And that is how we have this blue wave in this country. What is your response to that? Because you have a lot of people that are in the Republican Party that are still devoted to things that Trump says, even though most of Americans feel like some of it is outlandish. Well, I think if you look at not just Illinois, but if you look at the nation in general, anyone that had an R next to their name had a bullseye on them. When you lost Texas, when you lose Kansas, when you lose Iowa, when you lose Michigan, when you lose even Maine, you've had a senator there that's been there for over 15 years, 16 years. That's gotta be a wake-up call. Our message, Our party is not resonating with the people. Now, do I believe that a lot of the Democratic seats that they took in this cycle are those forever? Absolutely not. I think a lot of them are being rented. I think we have an opportunity in 28 if we get our act together to retake a lot of those seats. People say this is the worst time for Republicans ever, but they were saying the same thing for Democrats in 2010 and 2016. So the pendulum swings both ways, But I think the bigger issue is, especially here in Illinois, is that we don't have an infrastructure for candidate recruitment. We don't have an infrastructure for getting out our vote. And when you don't have those two things and you don't have a strong plan, you can't get people to invest. And that means you can't get donors. And so those are the three things that Illinois needs to do to rebuild the party. But most of all, we have to get our voice back and we have to get the people on our side. All right, Aaron Del Mar, thank you for your time. Thanks. Thanks.