Speaker Chris Welch (D-Hillside) speaks about the House rules Wednesday. [Blue Room Stream]   

As the second General Assembly since the pandemic gets underway, the House is returning to more normal procedures by eliminating remote voting on bills for lawmakers.  

Gov. JB Pritzker receives his first COVID-19 vaccine in Springfield in March 2021.    

Illinois’ COVID-19 disaster declaration will end in May, three years after it was first issued, Gov. JB Pritzker announced Tuesday.  

Rep. Tony McCombie (R-Savanna) speaks at a news conference Tuesday with House Republican budget leaders. [Ben Szalinski/The Daily Line] 

With new budget teams on both sides of the aisle in the House, House Republicans are hoping the changes mean more opportunities for their party to engage in the process and seek reforms to how state budgets are crafted. 

The Illinois Capitol.   

Illinois’ teacher shortage remains persistent and requires more legislative action, according to a survey of 80 percent of the state’s school districts by the Illinois Association of Regional Superintendents of Schools.  

Gov. JB Pritzker thanks Deputy Gov. Christian Mitchell, left, at a news conference in Chicago Friday. [Gov. JB Pritzker/Facebook] 

Deputy Gov. Christian Mitchell will leave Gov. JB Pritzker’s administration in early March, Pritzker announced at an unrelated news conference Friday alongside Mitchell.   

The Illinois State Capitol   

The December Commission on Government Forecasting and Accountability (CGFA) report shed light on how tax and fee hikes passed by lawmakers in 2019 have raised revenue to pay for Rebuild Illinois and other infrastructure projects. But the report also shows some revenue sources in the current year are beginning to slow down. 

House Majority Leader Robyn Gabel (D-Evanston). [ILGA] 

New House Majority Leader Robyn Gabel (D-Evanston) has big shoes to fill as she replaces the popular former leader Greg Harris, but she feels the transition will be natural.    

Tom DeVore, right, campaigns with former Sen. Darren Bailey (R-Xenia), left, the day before Election Day last year. [Ben Szalinski/The Daily Line] 

Republican attorney Tom DeVore has filed another state lawsuit seeking a restraining order exempting clients from following the state’s new “assault weapons” ban, this time including for some of the state’s most conservative politicians.  

The National Rifle Association (NRA) also filed the second federal lawsuit challenging the ban.  

Rep. Will Guzzardi (D-Chicago) speaks at a news conference in Chicago Thursday. [SEIU] 

Rep. Will Guzzardi (D-Chicago) is unveiling a proposal supporters say would make billionaires pay “their fair share” of taxes.  

A supporter of Gov. JB Pritzker holds up a campaign sign in support of abortion in front of Lt. Gov. Juliana Stratton after Pritzker and Stratton won reelection on November 8. [Ben Szalinski/The Daily Line] 

Sunday marked 50 years since the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in the 1973 Roe v. Wade case that abortion was a constitutional right. The anniversary came less than a year after the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade last June in its ruling on Dobbs v. Jackson, which upheld Mississippi’s new abortion restrictions.   

As the abortion landscape dramatically shifted across the country in 2022, little changed in Illinois, but both pro-choice and pro-life advocates are continuing to work to influence lawmakers to see their side of one of America’s most controversial issues.