State Representative Ryan Spain (R-Peoria) said the General Assembly is wasting time failing to address ethics reform in a press conference Wednesday.
Spain and his Republican colleagues said the Democratic House Supermajority is overlooking the urgently needed reform to stamp out political corruption.
The Deputy Minority Leader said the ComEd 4 convictions are a week old, a former lawmaker who just left prison is back under the capitol dome today as a lobbyist.
Speaker Chris Welch shut down the ethics investigation into former Speaker Mike Madigan.
“It’s a conflict of interest,” said Spain. “We see far too many conflicts of interest here and far too few Democratic leaders stepping up to take seriously the issue of public corruption that plagues our state of Illinois.”
House Republicans said lawmakers should not be lobbyists at all, and the legislative inspector general should have subpoena powers to conduct full investigations and root out bad behavior.
The last statehouse watchdog called the office a ‘paper tiger’ without much power.
With two weeks left before the scheduled adjournment, the minority leaders say there’s plenty of time to move their ethics proposals through.
Source : 25 News
