Peoria Standard

Rep. Ryan Spain (R-Peoria) says that even though former Seaker of the House Mike Madigan has left Springfield, Democratic lawmakers are still relying on his bare-knuckled style of politics.

“The Madigan playbook still lives on here in Illinois,” Spain said in a video posted to YouTube. “Even though Madigan was relieved from power by his own caucus, they didn’t part ways with the Madigan playbook.”

Spain argues the proof is in the recently released legislative maps and the way Democrats came to create them.

“We’ve seen this play out time and time again,” he said. “This is the Madigan fair maps fakeout. “Step 1 is to block reform. This phase of the Madigan playbook took hold years ago when Madigan, not once but twice, blocked citizen-led redistricting reform proposals. The powerful speaker called in his top enforcer to ensure these reforms did not become law, setting the stage for our map-making process now.”

Spain charged Madigan took precautions to prevent reform-minded lawmakers like him from moving forward with any efforts to change the state constitution.

“Step 2 is to draw the maps behind closed doors and this phase begins regardless of if data is even underway to draw the maps, because ultimately it doesn’t matter to Democrats if we use real data,” he said. “They invite all the Democrats in and give them a chance to pick their voters. The map is made to maximize political advantage.”

Finally, Spain said the plan is capped by limiting debate.

“We’ll see Democrats limit debate and give the public as little notice as possible about hearings,” he said. “The last step is to pass the map in the 11th hour. This is what we see happen again and again. We know Democrats will blame the passage on the deadlines for the end of June to pass a map.”

Spain is imploring all voters who have grown tired of what he sees as the Madigan way to join him in protest.

 “I thought things would be better when a new speaker was elected, but this is the same playbook being executed again and again,” he said.  

Spain has previously pointed an accusatory finger at Gov. J.B. Pritzker.  

"While running for office, Gov. Pritzker promised to veto any partisan legislative maps and urged lawmakers to create an independent commission to handle redistricting," he said in an April 28 Facebook post. "Yesterday he went back on his word and made it clear that he will not be supporting fair maps in Illinois."

In 2018, Pritzker vowed to veto any “unfair” map and said that the state’s constitution should be amended to establish an independent commission that would take over the map-making process. The commission idea never got off the ground and Pritzker signed off on the redrawn maps.

While the once-every-decade task of redrawing the maps typically falls to the party in charge, Republicans had hoped for a fairer process this cycle given Census Bureau data normally relied on to complete the process won’t be available before an end-of-June deadline

The Illinois constitution states if that deadline is missed, an eight-member bipartisan commission must be formed with four members from each party to finish redrawing the districts by Aug. 10.