Chicago City Wire

Republican political strategist Chris Robling doesn’t see how Gov. J.B. Pritzker could be serious in his threat to have local law enforcement and the Illinois State Police take action against businesses that defy his stay-at-home order in moving to reopen the state economy.

“Everyone in Illinois knows we need all of our police working to protect us from the criminals he is setting free from our prisons,” Robling told Chicago City Wire in a rebuke of one aspect of the governor’s ongoing strategy for slowing the spread of the deadly virus. “We don’t have time for cops to be stopping by flower shops writing citations when we’ve got murderers being let out on our streets.”

With several counties taking steps to reopen their counties despite a series of restrictions the governor has put in place as part of his five-phase Restore Illinois plan, Pritzker is now vowing to retaliate against violators by stripping the licenses of businesses and individual professionals and having law enforcement take action.

Robling argues small business owners are doing the only thing many of them feel they can do in trying to keep their businesses open and maintain their livelihoods.

“They see the governor’s plan and feel it’s too slow, too complicated and too insensitive to the needs of average people and their families,” he said. “What he’s proposing means more stagnation, more economic decline and more outmigration for this state.”

Robling points to a recent Illinois Policy Institute survey that found three out of every four residents across the state believe it’s time for small businesses to get back to work as proof of the urgency of the moment.

“The governor shouldn’t be making all these decisions alone, especially when you look at how bad some of his choices have been,” he said. “I never thought he would do some of the things he has, like holding the primary that caused the number of coronavirus cases to skyrocket, but here we are.”