Durbin, Duckworth, Pritzker: Madigan Needs To Go As Party Leader

ILLINOIS — U.S. Sens. Dick Durbin and Tammy Duckworth and Gov. J.B. Pritzker are calling on Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan to step down as leader of the state Democratic Party as an alleged bribery scheme tied to him increasingly undermines Democratic policy initiatives across the state.

Durbin was the first to speak out Tuesday after the state's graduated income tax ballot initiative was defeated by voters and down-ballot Democrats failed to expand their statehouse majority.

"Candidates who had little or no connection with him whatsoever were being tarred as Madigan allies who are behind corruption and so forth and so on," Durbin said in an interview with WTTW. "It was really disconcerting to see the price that we paid on that. I hope he takes that to heart and understands that his presence as chairman of our party has not helped."

Durbin won reelection Tuesday with 52.7 percent of the vote and will go on to serve his fifth term in the U.S. Senate.

Meanwhile, Duckworth — who was not up for reelection this year — told the State Journal-Register that the state party should consider new leadership.

"The ongoing investigation surrounding Speaker Madigan is an unnecessary distraction and makes it harder to carry out the work of helping the people of Illinois," she said. "As our nation hopefully embarks on a brighter path with a new president, the Illinois Democratic Party and the Illinois House of Representatives should consider new leadership to continue the progress we’ve made at the state level and build on it."

Pritzker followed Durbin and Duckworth's lead on Thursday, saying opponents of his graduated income tax proposal were able to tap into voters' concerns about corruption and a general lack of trust in government.

"The Republicans and the billionaires that sided with them were able to use the speaker as their foil, and that hurt our ability, our state's ability, to get things done," the governor said.

Madigan, 78, has not been charged, and prosecutors did not identify him by name when they charged Commonwealth Edison — Illinois' largest electric company — with bribery in July. But prosecutors allege the house speaker accepted lucrative jobs, contracts and monetary payments from ComEd in exchange for passing legislation the electric company favored and opposing legislation that would have hurt the company's bottom line.

Illinois Republicans pounced on those allegations.

"The people of Illinois now live in a state where both the Speaker of the House and the Governor are under criminal investigation," party chairman Tim Schneider said at the time. "Even for a state with a history of corruption, this is unprecedented."

WBEZ, Chicago's NPR affiliate, reported in April that federal investigators are also looking into property tax breaks Pritzker received on his Chicago mansion.

Opponents of the graduated income tax proposal made Madigan a central figure in their campaign, pointing to the corruption allegations against him as proof that Democratic lawmakers could not be trusted.

"(Voters are) being asked, 'Hey, trust us,' but what we're saying is we have a General Assembly that has just run amok on spending and hasn't addressed any of the other major problems," opposition group leader Jason Heffley told the Better Government Association, a nonpartisan watchdog.

Durbin, Duckworth and Pritzker all stopped short of calling for Madigan to resign from office.

As for Madigan, he says he's not going anywhere. Calling Illinois the "anchor" in Democrats' so-called "blue wall," he touted his electoral record and promised to continue "our fight for working families as chairman of the Democratic Party of Illinois."

"I am proud of my record electing Democrats who support workers and families and represent the diversity of our state," Madigan said in a statement. "Together, we have successfully advanced progressive policies that have made Illinois a strong Democratic state with supermajorities in the legislature."

Those progressive policies do not include a graduated income tax, and the party's supermajorities appear to have shrunk Tuesday night.