Lawmakers Rebuke Pritzker Following Violent Holiday Weekend in Chicago (Springfield, IL) – Three Republican state representatives who also serve as law enforcement officers sharply criticized Gov. J.B. Pritzker on Monday, saying the governor has downplayed Chicago’s surge in violent crime at a time when residents are seeing increasingly brazen attacks.
The criticism follows a violent holiday weekend that saw a teenager killed and eight others wounded in two separate shootings near downtown Christmas tree-lighting festivities. Across the city, police reported three people killed and 26 injured in shootings between Friday and Sunday. The weekend violence came days after a separate high-profile attack on the CTA in which a young woman was set on fire; authorities have said the suspect was a repeat offender on electronic monitoring.
State Reps. John M. Cabello, Patrick Sheehan and Dennis Tipsword — all of whom are active law enforcement officers — issued a joint statement accusing Pritzker of minimizing the city’s crime concerns.
“Governor Pritzker continues to turn a blind eye to the public safety crisis gripping the City of Chicago and emboldening criminals across the state,” they said. They pointed to remarks the governor made earlier this year in which he noted that “big cities have crime,” as well as a late-night television appearance in which he jokingly dismissed criticism of his crime policies.
“Public safety isn’t a laughing matter,” the lawmakers said.
They argued that policies supported by the governor, particularly the SAFE-T Act, have weakened accountability in the justice system. They renewed their push to repeal the law, which overhauled pretrial detention rules and other aspects of criminal justice in Illinois.
“As police officers, we’ve seen firsthand how communities have become less safe,” their statement continued. “What happened at the tree-lighting ceremony this weekend and last week on the CTA are further examples of why we need to repeal the broken SAFE-T Act.”
The lawmakers said Illinois families “need to know their government, and the Governor, takes public safety seriously,” warning that lives depend on it.
A spokesperson for Pritzker did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Lawmakers Rebuke Pritzker Following Violent Holiday Weekend in Chicago
