What are metro-east lawmakers saying about the contentious legislative session?

Illinois lawmakers across the metro-east in both parties believe there were a handful of legislative victories throughout the 2026 legislative session that just wrapped up — despite local politicians being divided about the budget largely along party lines.

The $56 billion budget passed Monday capped the spring lawmaking in Springfield with most Democrats supporting the spending bills for the 2027 fiscal year and also revenue and tax changes.

Rep. Jay Hoffman, D-Swansea, said fiscal uncertainty coming from Washington D.C. and stubborn inflation increasing the cost of living motivated state lawmakers as they were crafting this budget.

“We went into this budget with that in mind — wanting to make sure it was fiscally responsible, provide for our priorities and not be balanced on the back of working families and families who are in need,” Hoffman said. “I think we accomplished that.”

To support the growth in spending, the budget bills created new taxes on social media companies, prediction markets, fantasy sports and digital advertising.

It also included a $300 million increase in funding for education in the state’s Evidence-Based Funding program that was built to support Illinois’ neediest districts and $50 million for a property tax relief grant program meant for districts with high tax rates.

“I would have liked to have seen additional dollars go into schools, but we just didn’t have the fiscal ability because of what has happened in Washington,” Hoffman said.

Not all local Democrats voted for the budget, including Sen. Chris Belt, D-Swansea.

“There are positive components in this budget, including continued support for education and persons living with disabilities and their families,” Belt said in a statement. “However, I had concerns with the overall package and did not feel it struck the right balance between necessary investments and the financial burden placed on taxpayers.”

Local Republicans contend the budget doesn’t make enough meaningful efforts to address affordability concerns felt by Illinoisans.

“We just keep asking for more,” said Rep. Amy Elik, R-Godfrey. “It requires the Democrats in power to find these creative ways that they think won’t affect people in Illinois, but it absolutely does in some way or another because these taxes on businesses and different industries do get passed along to consumers.”

While she can get behind delaying an annual 1.3 cent per gallon increase in Illinois’ gas tax from July 1 to January 1, Elik said it should have been delayed even further.

“That’s not the kind of impactful gas tax savings that we wanted,” Elik said.

Her constituents in the metro-east often drive across the Mississippi River to buy their gas, Elik said. Currently, prices in Missouri can be 65 cents per gallon cheaper than in Illinois, according to GasBuddy. Prices have increased more than $1.50 since the start of the ongoing war in Iran.

Local GOP lawmakers also wanted to see more legislation to address property tax relief specifically for seniors, Elik said.

Sen. Erica Harriss, R-Glen Carbon, said this budget continues a pattern of spending growth that outpaces what Illinois families see in their household budgets.

“A budget that truly puts affordability first would have started with the everyday pressures facing families, seniors, and small businesses,” Harriss said in a statement. “Instead, this plan asks taxpayers to shoulder the burden of even more government spending.”

Legislative victories

While Republicans were not thrilled with the budget, they are still celebrating some other legislative victories passed during the session.

A previous measure mandated high schoolers take two years of a foreign language by the 2028-2029 school year. However, lawmakers passed a bill that allows students to substitute classes in career and technical education, art or music for the language requirements.

There’s already a shortage of foreign language teachers, especially in rural parts of the state, Elik said. The bill received near unanimous bipartisan support in both chambers and now awaits Gov. JB Pritzker’s signature.

“I cannot understate enough how excited I am about this win, and it is common sense,” Elik said. “It gives our schools flexibility, but, most importantly, our students have the flexibility in their schedule, and they can explore these career paths that maybe they hadn’t thought of before.”

Other legislation that had broad bipartisan support provided some victories for lawmakers.

What some are calling landmark legislation to regulate artificial intelligence, which had support from tech companies OpenAI and Anthropic, was a “very good first step,” Hoffman said.

The bill would require the largest companies developing AI language models to create and publish a transparency framework, measure the change of catastrophic risk and respond to safety risks.

There were others that didn’t cross the finish line. For example, measures to aid the horse racing industry by incentivizing racetrack facilities improvements, as Fairmount Park plans to build a permanent casino, didn’t get passed and was disappointing, Hoffman said.

“I’m committed to making sure that there are reasonable incentives put in place to make sure that the horse racing industry not only thrives in Illinois but grows,” he said.