{"id":1346575,"date":"2022-02-27T07:20:24","date_gmt":"2022-02-27T12:20:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1346575"},"modified":"2022-02-27T07:26:30","modified_gmt":"2022-02-27T12:26:30","slug":"illinois-governor-bought-state-contractor-stock-while-in-office","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/illinois-governor-bought-state-contractor-stock-while-in-office\/","title":{"rendered":"Illinois Governor Bought State Contractor Stock While in Office"},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"&quot;\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">18<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Fillinois-governor-bought-state-contractor-stock-while-in-office%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1346575&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><div><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/justthenews.com\/sites\/default\/files\/styles\/social_media_share\/public\/2020-05\/GettyImages-1044342256.jpg?h=e95f6fa4&#038;itok=bD86KxD7\" class=\"ff-og-image-inserted\" alt=\"image\" \/><\/div>\n<p>A new report alleges a blind trust set up to manage Gov. J.B. Pritzker\u2019s fortune bought stock in one of Illinois\u2019 biggest contractors.<\/p>\n<p>According to the non-partisan <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bettergov.org\/news\/pritzker-trust-bought-stock-in-a-top-illinois-contractor-after-he-was-elected-governor\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Better Government Association<\/a>, the investment was in Centene Corp. in 2020, the same year Pritzker&#8217;s administration made several decisions that benefited the company\u2019s bottom line. Centene is one of the state\u2019s largest Medicaid contractors.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cCentene has made millions on serving our most vulnerable population under Medicaid, and it is not appropriate or ethical for the governor to be a known investor,\u201d said State Rep. Tony McCombie, R-Savanna.<\/p>\n<p>One of Pritzker\u2019s campaign pledges was to purge his personal portfolio of companies holding stage contracts.<\/p>\n<p>State Rep. Deanne Mazzochi, R-Elmhurst, said the governor needs to explain himself.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe time has come for the governor to come clean with the residents of Illinois and be open, honest and fully transparent about his financial interests during his tenure,\u201d said Mazzochi.<\/p>\n<p>A BGA review of public records revealed the purchase of Centene stock could have been made anytime during 2020. While the blind trust is designed to guard Pritzker from knowing when the investment in Centene was made, actions by his administration nevertheless benefited the health care giant.<\/p>\n<p>As a result, Deputy House Minority Leader Rep. Tom Demmer, R-Dixon, filed <a href=\"https:\/\/www.ilga.gov\/legislation\/BillStatus.asp?DocNum=5700&#038;GAID=16&#038;DocTypeID=HB&#038;SessionID=110&#038;GA=102\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">new legislation<\/a> aimed at strengthening state ethics law by extending the list of who is required to file quarterly statements of economic interest to include department heads within the Executive branch.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIllinois taxpayers are justifiably skeptical about public officials and those who serve under them directly taking advantage of their position of public trust to turn a personal profit,\u201d Demmer said in a written statement. \u201cHeads of state departments should be held to the same rigorous standards for filing timely and accurate financial disclosures currently in place for statewide constitutional officers, members of the General Assembly and others as prescribed by state law.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>There was no response from the governor\u2019s office when asked for comment.<\/p>\n<p>The BGA reports Pritzker&#8217;s attorney, Marc Elias, rebuked the report.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe only information he received is a ready-to-file Statement of Economic Interest, which contains no values,\u201d Elias told the BGA in a written statement. \u201cTo suggest otherwise is not only inaccurate but potentially libelous.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A new report alleges a blind trust set up to manage Gov. J.B. Pritzker\u2019s fortune bought stock in one of Illinois\u2019 biggest contractors.According to the non-partisan Better Government Association, the<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2315279,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1346575","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1346575","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1346575"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1346575\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2315279"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1346575"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1346575"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1346575"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}