Illinois’ $55.2B budget ‘incomplete,’ Civic Federation president says
[June 07, 2025]
By Ben Szalinsk
SPRINGFIELD — Illinois’ latest budget misses the mark in several key
areas, according to one independent nonprofit fiscal analyst.
State lawmakers sent Gov. JB Pritzker a $55.2 billion budget on May 31
that raises $1 billion in new revenue and increases spending by more
than $2 billion in fiscal year 2026 compared to the current year.
But the head of one of Chicago’s top nonpartisan government research
organizations said lawmakers made too many short-term decisions to
balance the budget in fiscal year 2026 that could make future fiscal
years more challenging.
“It’s an incomplete budget,” Civic Federation President Joe Ferguson
told Capitol News Illinois. “It does not add in any meaningful way to
discuss any structural issues the state has. It’s a maintenance budget.”
Ferguson said a key reason for that is at least $271 million in fund
sweeps used to balance the general revenue fund. Fund sweeps occur when
lawmakers dip into lesser-known and underutilized funds outside the main
general fund to use as a source of revenue for the fiscal year. This
year’s budget also pauses several transfers to keep certain dollars
available in the general fund for use this year.
For example, the budget calls for pausing the final transfer of motor
fuel sales tax revenue to the road fund. The move would free up $171
million of general fund spending in FY26, but delays putting that money
toward road construction projects.
“It’s not balanced on gimmicks,” House Speaker Chris Welch, D-Hillside,
told Capitol News Illinois for the latest episode of the “Illinois
Lawmakers” program. “It’s balanced based on revenues and expenditures,
and it’s based on what we know. We passed a budget based on what we knew
at the time, and we weren’t going to pass the budget with cuts alone.”
The FY26 budget would also suspend the monthly transfer to the “rainy
day” fund for one year, freeing up $45 million for general fund use.
“It’s absolutely a mistake,” Ferguson said, calling that decision
“troubling.”
The “rainy day” fund should continue to grow over time, he said,
especially “knowing that we are going to need to go to some last-case
resorts in all likelihood when we understand the federal impact and when
we approach the transit issues as well, and this was not the moment to
go to that well.”
The fund is still expected to grow from interest income and cannabis
revenue in FY26.
Lawmakers used some of the fund sweeps to give the governor authority
over a new $100 million “emergency” fund to plug unforeseen budget
shortfalls.
Pritzker argued at a news conference after the budget passed that the
state’s “structural” deficit – or the gap between ongoing spending and
baseline revenues – has improved since he took office in 2019.
“We’re diminishing the one-time expenditures that we have to make,”
Pritzker said. “So we’ve gotten, really, much closer than ever before to
balancing that structural deficit.”
Relying on fund sweeps will only make budgeting more challenging if a
crisis arrives, Ferguson said.
“Everyone acknowledges that it is all but certain that there are
additional things that are going to need to be attended to in the coming
months,” Ferguson said.
An eye on Congress
New action from Congress that punches holes in state budgets, coupled
with the state’s public transportation fiscal cliff, could be a wake-up
call for lawmakers, Ferguson said.
The U.S. House has already passed a domestic policy plan that would
shift more cost of government programs to states, cut Medicaid funding
and phase out clean energy tax credits. The Senate is expected to make
changes to the legislation, but President Donald Trump wants to sign the
bill into law by July 4.
While many components may not hit Illinois’ budget this year, state
lawmakers are watching for any changes that could require them to return
to Springfield and adjust the FY26 budget.
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The Illinois Capitol Building is pictured on the final night of the
2025 spring session on May 31, 2025. (Capitol News Illinois photo by
Andrew Adams)
“We have told the caucus to stand on the ready,” Welch said. State
lawmakers boosted spending in the FY26 budget for safety net hospitals
and federally qualified health centers, but the state wouldn’t be able
to absorb major federal cuts to Medicaid.
“We got some room in there to be able to respond, but it’s hard to
prepare when you don’t know exactly what’s coming down the pipe,” House
budget leader Rep. Kam Buckner, D-Chicago, said during a news conference
Thursday with the Democratic Legislative Campaign Committee.
House Republican Leader Tony McCombie, R-Savanna, was less worried
Congress will cut Medicaid and other key benefits.
“After conversations with the Illinois delegation, I don’t feel that
there’s going to be any concerns with cuts that are important in our
Medicaid budget,” McCombie told Capitol News Illinois.
Last-minute budgeting
Democrats unveiled a more than 3,300-page spending plan about 24 hours
before it passed the General Assembly, while the $1 billion tax plan was
filed about five hours before lawmakers took a vote.
Ferguson, the Civic Federation president, criticized the legislative
process that gives lawmakers and the public little time to review the
budget’s contents.
“It was chaotic, nontransparent – nontransparent even to the legislators
that had to vote on it – and not really the way that we want to go about
this business, especially at a sensitive time,” he said.
A group of conservative lawmakers also contended the process was illegal
in a lawsuit filed this week in Sangamon County. The Illinois Freedom
Caucus argues that the budget amendments were not read on three separate
days in each chamber of the General Assembly, which they say violates
the state constitution.
The constitution states a bill “shall be read by title on three
different days in each house,” but does not specify that each amendment
to a bill receive the same.
Each of the bills were read on three separate days this spring in both
chambers, even though the substantial amendment containing the budget
was filed in the final hours. For example, the bill lawmakers used to
raise $1 billion of revenue was originally filed to establish an Emmitt
Till commemorative day. The bill met the three readings requirement in
both chambers before the Emmitt Till Day provision was removed in the
final hours of session in favor of the tax plan.
The constitution also states that it’s up to the House speaker and
Senate president to “certify that the procedural requirements for
passage have been met.”
In applying what’s known as the “enrolled bill doctrine,” the Supreme
Court has consistently declined to infringe on the legislature’s
authority to certify its own bills, due to separation of powers
concerns. It has also consistently upheld broad authority for the
General Assembly to gut the original contents of a bill and amend it
with a new subject, making the lawsuit a long shot.
Capitol News Illinois is
a nonprofit, nonpartisan news service that distributes state government
coverage to hundreds of news outlets statewide. It is funded primarily
by the Illinois Press Foundation and the Robert R. McCormick Foundation.
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