Johnson budget spends and taxes more

Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson’s 2027 budget proposal includes a new package tax, a new tax on large employers and several tax increases.

Johnson introduced his $17.6 billion spending plan on Wednesday, up from $16.7 billion this year.

The mayor said his budget ensures that every Chicagoan receives their fair share of the city’s investments, services and opportunities.

“Funded by responsible spending cuts that protect essential services and by asking the wealthy and the largest corporations in this city to pay their fair share,” Johnson said.

The budget includes a 15-cent tax on non-medical and non-food containers and packages, plus a $25 per employee monthly tax on large businesses outside of socioeconomically disadvantaged areas.

The mayor’s office said the Equitable Employer Tax would bring in an estimated $113.8 million. The tax would fall on companies with 125 full-time employees or more. Johnson’s budget says that it impact 3% of the city’s registered businesses.

Last month, a group of 29 Chicago aldermen advised the mayor they would work on a budget that includes no head tax or tax on employers.

“If we can show the public that we’re being good fiscal stewards and looking at what the right size of government should be, creating technology efficiencies and then looking at revenue last, I think that’s a better narrative versus what this mayor is proposing,” Alderman Gilbert Villegas told The Center Square.

Aldermen rejected Johnson’s head tax proposal last year and passed an alternative budget, which the mayor allowed to take effect without his signature or veto.

Johnson’s new budget raises the Personal Property Lease Transaction tax from 15% to 20% and the sports wagering tax from 10.25% to 20%.

The PPLT tax hike is projected to raise an additional $234 million and the betting tax hike is expected to bring in an extra $37 million.

Illinois Hotel & Lodging CEO Michael Jacobson said Johnson’s proposed head tax, PPLT increase and liquor tax increase would add to rising cost burdens for hotels and businesses.

“City leaders must reject these proposals and pursue a budget that supports local businesses,” Jacobson said in a statement.

The spending plan calls for using $42.9 million in tax increment financing surplus and $37.7 million in catalyst fund revenue.

The mayor touted a $30.9 million subsidy to Chicago Public Libraries and prioritized funding for community violence intervention.

“We are making a historic $40.6 million investment in CVI, activating 390 street outreach workers and 800 peacekeepers,” Johnson said.

The mayor also called for the permanent establishment of the Department of Community Wellness and Safety.

Keep reading

Don’t Look Now, But Yet Another Chicago ‘Violence Interrupter’ Has Committed Violent Felonies

Angalwon Gilmore, 28, started his day at a Chicago CRED (Create Real Economic Destiny) office flashing gang signs at the anti-violence center’s own security cameras. Hours later he used a Lyft account registered as “Angawon CRED” to get a ride from that same building.

Did he misspell his own name? You make the call. Anyway, he climbed into the back of a 33-year-old woman’s 2013 Acura wearing a COVID mask…and then tried to carjack her. Thank heavens Lyft has a policy against their drivers carrying the proper tools for armed self-defense, right?

Angalwon yelled at her to change direction. When she did what he wanted to keep the situation from turning worse, he attacked from behind in the 6400 block of South Rhodes, wrapping his arm around her neck and trying to pull her out of the driver’s seat into the back. The struggle went on for several minutes. She fought hard, jamming a leg under the dash and steering wheel so he couldn’t pull her free. He eventually bailed with her keys. She called 911.

Gilmore is now detained on attempted vehicular hijacking, robbery, and aggravated battery. Phone data, Lyft records, the driver’s photo-lineup identification, and a police report that lists Chicago CRED as his employer tied him to the attack.

This is not some one-off fluke by a single “violence interruptor” gone bad. It’s the predictable result of a racket that Governor JB Pritzker has shoveled large amounts of Illinois taxpayer money into—community violence intervention nonprofits, “peacekeeper” programs, and questionable NGOs like Chicago CRED.

CRED was founded by Arne Duncan, Barack Obama’s Secretary of Education. These operations take federal grants (and private philanthropy, too) and hand stipends and provide soft programming to men already deep in criminal street life. Then they claim they’re “interrupting violence.”

The pattern keeps repeating. Jamari Edwards, a CeaseFire Chicago violence interrupter, got 22 years in federal prison after a string of armed carjackings that included shooting one victim in the leg. Kellen McMiller was photographed standing next to Pritzker at a Peacekeeper event just days before he was charged with murder in a Mag Mile smash-and-grab at a Louis Vuitton store that killed an innocent bystander. He had ties to CRED’s FLIP program and outstanding warrants.

Another so-called peacekeeper, Chester Alexander, was arrested after swinging at a Chicago cop during an arrest and was found with suspected ecstasy pills. Even the director of CeaseFire Illinois, Tio Hardiman, was arrested in 2013 on domestic battery charges after prosecutors said he punched and kicked his wife, leaving her with a swollen lip, bruises, and a cut on her neck. He was later removed by the organization.

Gilmore allegedly used the cover of an anti-violence job and a rideshare account bearing the nonprofit’s name to set up a working woman who was just trying to earn a living. That’s not outreach. That is a thug with a taxpayer-funded paycheck and a nonprofit logo. Paying people like this and calling it “prevention” is a scam. It doesn’t reform them, it subsidizes them.

Keep reading

SURPRISE! Final Cost of Obama’s Hideous Presidential Center Now Projected at THREE TIMES the Original Estimate

Obama’s eyesore of a presidential center in Chicago opened barely three months ago and is now projected to cost three times more than originally estimated. How fitting!

Just weeks ago it was reported that employees at the center are already complaining about the working conditions and now this. Not to mention the contractors who were allegedly jilted out of money owed for work done.

At least Obama doesn’t have to worry about the extra costs. His party and all of their rich friends would never leave him hanging.

FOX News reports:

Obama’s billion-dollar baby: Chicago center’s price tag hits monumental milestone, tripling original estimate

The price tag for the beleaguered Obama Presidential Center is now projected to top $1 billion, nearly triple its original estimate, the foundation overseeing construction of the Chicago facility told Fox News Digital.

Confirmation of the 10-figure cost marks another chapter in the troubled history of the much-delayed project, which opened five years behind schedule amid controversy over its use of public parkland and claims that subcontractors were stiffed out of millions of dollars. It comes as newly released financial records reviewed by Fox News Digital offer a fresh look at the finances of the Obama Foundation, the former president’s private nonprofit that oversaw construction of the billion-dollar project.

The sprawling campus on the Windy City’s south side was originally expected to open in 2021, with construction costs estimated at $300 million to $350 million. But years of federal reviews, legal challenges and construction delays preceded its eventual opening in June 2026, by which time projected costs had skyrocketed to approximately $850 million.

Hailed by Democrats and supporters as a historic investment in the community and a tribute to the former president’s legacy, the center was promoted as a catalyst for jobs, economic growth and new opportunities for underserved communities.

Anyone want to take bets on how much this eventually ends up costing Chicago taxpayers?

Keep reading

Transgender Suspect Fatally Stabs Victim More Than 13 Times, Breaks Knife in Skull For ‘Disrespecting His Gender’

A transgender person (biological male) fatally stabbed a man in South Side Chicago for disrespecting his gender.

Kelly Day, 32, stabbed the victim, identified as 50-year-old Larry Young, more than 13 times last Wednesday near a gas station in the 1400 block of East 87th Street.

The attack was so brutal and violent that the knife’s blade broke off in Larry Young’s skull.

According to the Chicago Tribune, the stabbing occurred after Day had an encounter with a separate group of people earlier in the day at a McDonald’s bathroom.

They reportedly mocked Kelly Day for using the women’s bathroom at McDonald’s before the fatal stabbing.

Later in the day, Young was walking down 87th Street when he made a comment about Day’s appearance and gender.

Kelly Day became enraged and followed Young across the street near the gas station. After a brief altercation, Day stood over Young and repeatedly stabbed him in the skull.

Keep reading

The Obama Death Star Is Out Of Hope

I’ve always thought Barack Obama was a race-hustling, egomaniacal, anti-American Communist and Islamist, and his actions and history have vindicated that belief. The media lauded him as the greatest orator in history, yet by the standards I taught my speech and debate students, he was mediocre at best. No Obama speech is remotely in the same league as those of Martin Luther King or Abraham Lincoln. He just didn’t have it in him, largely because he was entirely self-centered.

Obama was expert at self-promotion and self-aggrandizement, so much so that he was given a Nobel Peace Prize almost immediately after being elected for being Barack Obama. At least one member of the Nobel Committee that awarded that prize later admitted it was a stupid thing to do. As President of the Harvard Law Review, he did almost nothing, and only a single, 1990, unsigned article on abortion has been attributed to him. He obviously liked the title and prestige, but not the work. He could never explain to even his friends what he did as a “community organizer” in Chicago.

With that non-management background, it’s hardly surprising things have already taken a nosedive at his presidential library that isn’t. The Daily Mail reports:

Barack Obama is facing a fresh humiliation at his ‘eyesore’ presidential center with workers slamming the project’s bosses and moving to unionize just months after it opened.

In a letter to colleagues this week, staff at the Chicago library said they were organizing a union due to the institute’s ‘increasing workloads’ and benefit rollbacks.

Workers have grown frustrated with leadership at Obama’s foundation after their concerns were met with ‘vague responses,’ according to the letter, first shared by the Chicago Sun-Times.

Issues with workloads and benefits have led to a ‘high turnover rate’ among employees, with many more ‘continuing to leave (and) taking with them their institutional knowledge and expertise,’ the letter claimed.

Workers say they were recently told that their healthcare costs would increase, promotions were suspended, and paid time off was reduced, despite also learning they would get no pay increases this winter.

Luke Gilday, an Obama Foundation employee and member of the union organizing committee, told the Sun-Times that workers decided to unionize because they ‘don’t even have a seat at the table.’

‘What we’re hoping for, and really the reason why we’re forming our union, is just because we believe we should have a say in the decisions that are being made that impact all of our lives,’ Gilday said.

Should anyone be surprised that the man who lied about Obamacare and so much else is stiffing the employees he’s depending upon to man his bizarre legacy? In building it, he operated like a standard Democrat:

The Obama center cost upwards of $850 million, far beyond its initial budget of $300 million. But just days before its grand opening in June, contractors alleged that they had not been paid for work on the building.

Several subcontractors claimed they were owed millions in past-due invoices, and African American Contractors Association president Omar Shareef said several workers told him they ‘wished they had never done (the project).’

Here’s irony:

In the organizing committee’s open letter, the group quoted directly from a letter Obama circulated during the 2016 presidential election, which called on workers to join unions across the nation.

‘If I were looking for a good job that lets me build some security for my family, I’d join a union. If I saw a problem in my workplace, I’d organize my coworkers to do something about it,’ the quote read.

Keep reading

Idaho Sheriff’s Office Claims It Might Have Solved Infamous ‘Tylenol Murders’ Case

An Idaho sheriff’s office believes that a man who died in a Boise church 44 years ago could be linked to the 1982 case in which several people were killed after taking tampered Tylenol.

The Ada County Sheriff’s Office said that a man who killed himself inside a Boise Catholic church was Dr. Mathew Betkouski, according to a news release. When the man was found in December 1982, he had no ID, only a large amount of cash and a typed letter with a false name.

Sheriff’s office cold case Detective Tim Cooper began looking at the case in 2019. He determined through photos and DNA that a Florida man who disappeared in 1982 and Betkouwski were one and the same.

Betkouski, who had worked in two drugstores in college, had discussed the use of cyanide to kill without being detected.

The 1982 Tylenol killings involved cyanide being substituted for the medicine in several Tylenol capsules. Seven people were killed in the Chicago area before the product was pulled from shelves.

Dr. Park Dietz, a forensic psychiatrist, said that by 2021, he believed Cooper was making connections that linked Betkouski to the Tylenol case.

More details will be released on the “Unsolved Mysteries” TV series episode titled “Unmasking the Tylenol Killer.”  The show will appear Oct. 9 on The Roku Channel.

Keep reading

Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson Says Illegal Immigrants Are an ‘Essential Part of Who We Are’

Chicago’s far left Mayor Brandon Johnson is taking a page out of Zohran Mamdani’s playbook and claiming that ilegal immigrants play in essential role in America.

Newsflash for the mayor. No. They don’t.

Johnson was making his comments in response to the Trump administration’s move to block illegal immigrants from receiving any kind of welfare.

This is something that Democrats simply can’t or won’t understand. Johnson also obscured the difference between legal and illegal immigrants, a tactic often employed by liberals on this issue.

Breitbart News reports:

Chicago’s radical Democrat Mayor Brandon Johnson joined New York’s socialist mayor to sue the Trump administration to protect legal and illegal migrants and their access to U.S. welfare programs, because, in his words, illegals are an “essential part of who we are.”

Johnson joined New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani in a lawsuit against President Donald Trump’s administration for shutting down welfare-dependent immigration to the United States through the “public charge” rule.

The Trump administration has resurrected the “public charge” rule, which makes legal immigrants less likely to secure green cards if they have used any form of welfare in the past, including subsidized healthcare services, food stamps, or public housing. But Democrats oppose the rule and claim that migrants who are not productive citizens have every right to be subsidized by the U.S. taxpayer through welfare programs…

In his message to the city, Johnson insisted that reinstating the rule “sweeps aside more than a century of settled law, as well as decades of federal guidance establishing clear limits on how public charge determinations can be made.” Johnson further alleges that the Trump administration’s rule “dramatically and unlawfully expands the government’s authority to consider an immigrant’s use of public benefits, allowing the federal government to consider virtually any means-tested or income-based public benefits while inviting officers to make decisions that are inconsistent and discriminatory.”

Johnson has just announced that he is going to seek a second term and ironically, this very issue could be a major stumbling block for him.

Black Chicagoans have been very critical of Johnson’s devotion to illegal immigrants while ignoring the needs of Americans living in the city.

Keep reading

2026 Chicago Socialism Conference Features Covid Masking Requirements

The 2026 Chicago Socialism Conference is requiring all attendees to wear N-95 or K-95 masks – and organizers will provide them for those without.

A description on the conference website adds:

“Please note: this requirement applies only to formal conference spaces and sessions—attendees should be aware of the possibility that attendees will be unmasked elsewhere in the conference hotel (or beyond) where they may informally congregate.”

Attendees are encouraged to test themselves for Covid ahead of time, and free tests will also be available on site.

The conference, which begins on Friday, will host a number of socialist speakers including Hasan Piker and DSA president Megan Romer.

In an about section, the conferences states “Socialism 2026 is a four-day conference bringing together thousands of socialists and radical activists from around the country to take part in discussions about social movements, abolition, Marxism, decolonization, working-class history, and the debates and strategies for organizing today.”

Continuing, it states, “Every year, the Socialism conference is a place where activists share lessons from their struggles—from anti-ICE organizing to the fight for gender liberation, from striking workers to Palestine solidarity campaigns, the struggle to stop the destruction of the planet, the fight against racism, and more.”

A conference agenda lists a number of programs including a “Marxism Education Series,” “Reproductive Justice Strategy Session,” “Sing, Struggle, Organize: Movement Songs, Political Education, and Collective Power,” and “Abolition Judaism: The Revolutionary Possibilities of Diaspora.”

Sponsors of the conference includes the DSA and the Palestinian Youth Movement among many other radical left organizations.

A code of conduct for the conference says they are committed to “uplifting and centering the voices and organizations of oppressed people and we know that interpersonal harm and harassment are pervasive in our society, and the left is not immune to these behaviors.”

Continuing, they state, “Our goal is to have a conflict- and crisis-free conference, and we are committed to working to de-escalate and resolve any problems that may arise.”

What is not clear from the code of conduct is whether the calls of political violence from Piker or other featured speakers violates the code of conduct or if threats towards conservatives and Republicans are allowed.

Tickets for the full conference range from $250 to $500 but if you identify as a student or low income, a subsidized option at $65 is also available.

Keep reading

Enes Kanter Freedom Files Federal Lawsuit Against Chicago Sky and City of Chicago After Ejection Over “Woman” T-Shirt — Demands Jury Trial

Former NBA star and human-rights activist Enes Kanter Freedom has filed a federal lawsuit after he was ejected from a Chicago Sky game for daring to wear a shirt stating a basic biological fact.

The 15-page complaint was filed Wednesday in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois.

Freedom named Chicago Women’s Basketball Operations, LLC, the company operating the Chicago Sky, the Metropolitan Pier and Exposition Authority, and the City of Chicago as defendants.

The lawsuit seeks injunctive relief and damages and demands a jury trial.

Freedom announced the legal action on X:

“Just filed a federal complaint.

“I’m taking legal action over my ejection from the @chicagosky game while peacefully exercising my First Amendment rights.

“My T-shirt did what the whole @WNBA apparently couldn’t: define a woman.

“No threats. No violence. Just biology. And somehow, that required a security escort.

“You don’t have to agree with my speech, but you don’t get to silence me for it.

“I will not be intimidated. I will not be silenced. I will continue to stand for women and defend free speech.”

Keep reading

Schools forced into borrowing cash because Chicago is late on taxes

A “perfect storm” of convoluted bureaucracy caused Cook County, Illinois to spend 10 years and $63 million building a property tax billing software that did not work. 

Because tax collection was delayed, Chicago Public Schools were forced to take a loan to stay operational, incurring $33 million in interest costs.

Key facts: A July 21 report from the Cook County inspector general found that the contractor designing the tax billing software, Tyler Technologies, received conflicting information from three different government agencies involved with the project.

The county Assessor’s Office helmed the first stage of the project. But when a new assessor was elected, he added new requirements that delayed the project.

The Treasurer’s Office gave input later on, and asked Tyler Technologies to use different home ownership data than the Assessor’s Office had provided, according to the IG report.

The Treasurer’s Office staff also reportedly argued with Tyler Technologies about how to design the tax billing software. This created an “openly adversarial” work environment, according to the audit. At one point, county staff were told to intentionally withhold necessary data from Tyler Technologies, the report stated.

Eventually, the county hired another contractor just to serve as a liaison between government officials and Tyler Technologies.

The county also required Tyler Technologies to hire a local project manager, but the first three managers departed because of “knowledge gaps or interpersonal conflicts with county employees,” according to the IG report.

The Treasurer’s Office began using the new tax software in late 2025, even though the county’s Bureau of Technology warned that there were “hundreds of errors.” County homeowners have still not received their 2025 tax bills as of Aug. 8, 2026.

The Clerk’s Office and Treasurer’s Office said Tyler Technologies did not assign enough staff to the project, and that its programmers were not always present at meetings about technical issues, the report states. But the audit also noted that Tyler Technologies’ staff sometimes voluntarily worked seven days a week and without pay to try and resolve issues with the tax system.

Keep reading