Prairie State Wire

Republican state House candidate Peter Breen wonders if Illinois residents will ever come first in the minds of lawmakers in Springfield.

“Starting any new program at a time when the people of Illinois are hurting desperately makes no sense, regardless of how well-intentioned the program may be,” Breen told the Prairie State Wire. “Even more, the people of Illinois were not clamoring for Medicaid for illegal aliens.”

Now running against incumbent state Rep. Terra Costa-Howard (D-Glen Ellyn) in the 48th District, Breen argues a provision in the state’s newly passed $42 billion budget that stands to make Illinois the first state in the country to provide Medicaid regardless of immigration status resonates as just more of the same.  

Under the guidelines of the bill Democrats passed during a recent four-day special session, all undocumented immigrants over the age of 65 with incomes of $12,670 or less would be eligible to receive Medicaid benefits as of July 1, 2021.

“I was surprised to see a brand new social program that’s not in any way funded by the federal government and has not been subject to great debate among the people of Illinois started up in the middle of the pandemic,” Breen added. “The General Assembly spends a lot of time doing nothing, then ramming through a budget in short order is a process that naturally leads to pork barrel spending and programs the people were not looking for and other measures that don’t have a direct relationship to where the people of the state are.”

Breen previously blasted the new state budget as out of touch with the people of the state.

“This is a failure in leadership and is entirely tone deaf in terms of what the people of Illinois need and want from their state,” he said.