Wrongdoing complaints against Illinois state employees jumps nearly 30%
[December 16, 2025]
By Greg Bishop | The Center Square
(The Center Square) – The number of complaints of wrongdoing by state
agencies under Gov. J.B. Pritzker has increased nearly 30% in the most
recent annual report.
The Office of Executive Inspector General released its annual report for
fiscal year 2025. The report found nearly 4,000 complaints, or a 29%
increase over the prior fiscal year.
“These published reports also illustrate a continued trend of misconduct
involving employees’ conflicts of interest and/or improper secondary
employment,” the OEIG’s Illinois Ethics Matters newsletter for December
said.
Asked about the report Monday at an unrelated event in Springfield,
Pritzker said it’s good people are filing complaints.
“I want people to, if they're doing something wrong, they should get
caught,” Pritzker said. “If people feel like somebody is doing something
wrong, they should report it and it should be investigated. So I
encourage people to do it.”
One case summary the OEIG shared found an agency deputy director
continued to have a financial interest in a vendor and was involved in
decisions to award work to the vendor.
“[A]nd there was an increase in payments to the vendor and an increase
in the vendor’s billing for subcontracted work,” the report said.
The OEIG said in response to the work, the agency is auditing that
vendor’s billing and reconciliations and implementing new policies and
procedures for conflicts of interest.
“The Governor’s Office is also mandated training for agency fiscal
officers relating to reconciliation for vendor payments,” the report
said.
Pritzker acknowledged ethics training.
“I do the training every year,” Pritzker said. “We have a lot of
training, that we do and I do think that we're attracting good people to
government and that's, you know, sometimes hard to do.”
State Rep. Brad Halbrook, R-Shelbyville, said the report shows there
needs to be more scrutiny on Pritzker’s management of state operations.
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“We know that when there's government money that there's going to be
all kinds of fraud, we know there's going to be all kinds of abuse,”
Halbrook said. “This stuff has to be fine-tooth combed so that we
can begin to root that out.”
Among the reported wrongdoing, the OEIG said of more than 500
Paycheck Protection Program fraud investigations, 378 resulted in
founded reports. The report shows dozens of state employees from the
Department of Children and Family Services, Department of Human
Services, and other state agencies defrauding more than $20,000 each
from the PPP.
“If employees were still employed by the State at the time reports
were issued, the OEIG recommended their termination from State
employment,” the report said. “Many employees resigned in lieu of
termination; for those who did not resign, they have either been
terminated or the disciplinary actions are still ongoing.”
The report also states the Illinois Attorney General’s Office has
criminally prosecuted a number of the individuals for PPP fraud.
The report also highlights were two six-figure fines leveled against
state employees after being found to have violated revolving door
provisions of the state Ethics Act. One high-profile case involved
the former director of the Illinois Department of Public Health, Dr.
Ngozi Ezike.
In January, the OEIG announced Ezike agreed to “a violation of the
Ethics Act and the facts comprising the violation, in that she
accepted employment and compensation from an entity which had
contracts involving IDPH with a cumulative value of $4.2 million and
over which she had exercised regulatory and licensing authority in
the year before her departure from State employment.”
Halbrook said there needs to be more oversight from majority
Democrats at the Illinois Statehouse.
“There's lots of things that we need to get in the open,” he said.
“We need to discuss and bring people to the table to sort this out.”
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