After a long fight to get on the ballot this November, Brad Bielert is ready to take on Carol Ammons. The Champaign County Libertarian Party wholeheartedly endorse him for the position and stands ready to fight with him.
Brad was born and raised in Champaign and his family has lived here for 3 generations. As an auto mechanic, he has seen the difficulties facing the community: the lack of economic development, the over taxation, politicians treating people like serfs, and the abysmal social justice. He wants to change all that.
The fight to get on the ballot began with a petitioning. Marching door to door late into the evening to meet the signature requirement. It was no easy task after working long days under the hoods of cars, not to mention having to convince people to speak during a global pandemic.
Obtaining the required signatures, the victory was short lived, as opponents filed an objection to his signature counts. Objectors initially claimed there was a false address associated with one signature. When pressed on the fact that Brad obtained ~50% more signatures than the requirement, his adversaries changed tactics, attempting to argue that a pending case appealing a prior judicial reduction in signature granted to third parties in light of the pandemic invalidated the number.
On Friday August 21, the Illinois Board of Elections decided to reject the objection and ruled that Brad’s name be on the ballot this fall. He is the only opponent to Carol Ammons.
During an interview I asked him why he’s running.
“I want to see unity. People working together for the people. I don’t want to burden people with government control, but instill in them their right to individuality.”
Asked about his opponent he said:
“Unlike my opponent, I want to see legislation that represents all people. I want to give the people the freedom due to them while keeping them safe and out of harms way.”
He said that is why the four pillars of his campaign are:
Fair Maps
Lower Property Taxes
Making Springfield Work Again
Social Equality
Brad makes a strong case for libertarianism, and the Champaign County Libertarian Party to endorse him.
Note: This new blog series will address, from a Libertarian perspective, policy issues facing Champaign County residents, and those of Illinois state more broadly. It will examine upcoming or recently passed laws, and inform you about how your elected officials voted on them.
Campaign season 2020 is underway in Champaign County: mailers are arriving by foot carried by the faithful letter carriers, political swag is beginning to fly off tables at local events, and yard signs will soon begin sprouting in lawns all around town. At least one such mailer detailing Rep. Carol Ammons’ agenda and key legislative record has already been making the rounds. I thought this would be a good chance to reflect on her representation and voting record over the 2019-2020 term to date.
Rep. Ammons’ recent mailer.
Rep. Ammons has been an ally on two issues that Libertarians care about deeply; namely, criminal justice reform and legalization of recreational marijuana use (see Sec. 1.7 of the LP party platform here). I applaud her efforts to provide transparency of public complaints of policing (HB2503), work to improve independent legal review of the polygraph process (HB2569), support for lowering the burden of appearing in court for persons held in State confinement (SB1890), and creation of criminal ramifications for law enforcement officials guilty of fraud (HB2112, HB2111). She also co-sponsored the recently passed bill legalizing recreational marijuana use in Illinois (HB0902), which was a landmark achievement in US legalization efforts in that it provides provisions to free non-violent drug offenders.
Bills co-sponsored or voted for by Rep. Ammons.
That said, much of her voting record has been in opposition to the values of liberty, freedom to operate, personal choice, smaller government, and fiscal responsibility. As evidence, I will briefly review bills she has supported — and explicitly calls out in her flyer — as they represent examples of the worst type of government.
Rep. Ammons supported the “Prescription Drug Pricing Transparency Act” which places new regulations on the healthcare industry within the State of Illinois at a time when health insurance costs continue to rise at rates greatly outpacing income and GDP growth. HB 156 burdens insurance provides with reporting requirements related to prescription drug coverage. Additionally, the law requires drug manufactures to provide justifications for increases in drug prices. While on the one hand this legislation does not change the right of manufacturers and insurers to price costs of insurance, it is clearly meant to publicly shame companies for their business practices.
Enter HB 471, a bill that amends the “Illinois Insurance Code” which empowers the State to reject ACA health insurance premium rate increase. By nebulously defining “unreasonable rate increases” it essentially allows the state to impose price controls on health insurance plans. Many might think this is good policy considering the rapidly rising health insurance costs; however, this bill will likely decrease choice among an already sparsely populated market. Insurer participation in the health exchange marketplace has continually dropped since the passage of the ACA from a peak of 5 insurers on average in 2015 to 2.35 in 2019, and as things stand today 15% of Illinois enrollees only have a single insurer option [1]. This is unsurprising considering the high costs of compliance. Price controls will only exacerbate the problem. As a case study, Land of Lincoln Health closed operations in 2016 after $7.1M in losses, despite $160M in government grants [2]. Along with decreasing choices, enrollment in the exchange has been declining at a rate between 7% and 9% per year from 2016 to 2018 [3]. I highly doubt adding price controls will solve these problems, and my prediction is that HB 471 will eventually require further Illinois subsidies to prop up failing marketplace plans.
In economic policy areas, Rep. Ammons voted for efforts that will weaken employment in Illinois, while raising overall State spending. She supported the “Lifting Up Illinois Working Family Act” (SB 1) that increases the minimum wage to $15/hour over 5 years, the bloated appropriates bill (SB 262) which adds between $574M and $1.3B to the state deficit [4], and an amendment to the Illinois tax code (SB 687) that raises corporate tax rates by a percentage point and creates a steep progressive income tax. While individuals and families making less than $100K per year will see similar or slightly reduced tax rates, higher earners will face steep taxes ranging from 7.75% to 7.99%. This is the second tax increase in four years, after the increase from 3.75% to 4.95% in 2017.
Ramifications of Illinois corporate and individual taxes have been felt for years. Corporations have been leaving Illinois for years [5] due to high costs of business as have individuals [6]. In fact, Illinois has the second highest rate of emigration surpassed only by New Jersey, based on data from moving companies [7,8]. This trend will likely continue given the increased corporate and individual tax rate increases, resulting in worsening financial situation within the state.
To put a cherry on the cake, Rep. Ammons supported broad subsidies for R&D and apprenticeships via SB 1591 and SB 191. The former amends the Illinois tax code to extend R&D tax credits to 2027 of up to 6.5% for certain expenses and creates and Apprenticeship Tax Credit of $3500 per employee (up to $5M per company!). While innovation is important, rather than increasing tax rates followed by subsidies, why not just let businesses keep more of their money? The latter bill creates a “21st Century Employment” grant program for community colleges that requires the state to pay at least 60% of proposed training costs. While no specific dollar amount is allocated for the training program—which is itself irresponsible governance—we can estimate the deficit due to the apprenticeship tax credits of up to $48.7M (based on the 13,900 apprenticeships identified in a 2016 report [9]). Rather than require the State to sponsor apprenticeships, why not let the plethora of unions in Illinois pay for them? That is part of their raison d’etre after all.
Overall, these hallmark proposals
supported by Rep. Ammons are misguided. They include bad governance, increased
regulations and price controls, tax hikes, and payments to special interests. I
expect this will result in decreased competition, further flight of taxpaying
corporations and individuals alike, and a worsening condition in Illinois. I
give Rep. Ammons a D- for the
2019-2020 term so far.
Added a nebulous definition of “unreasonable rate increase” which subjectively determined by a State committee
Requires all ACA healthcare exchange plans to file rate increase proposals with the Illinois Department of Public Health which will then determines whether to allow or deny them
United Van Lines, “2018 National Movers Survey: New Jersey Tops List of Outbound Moves while Western ad Southern States Lead Inbound Moves”, Jan. 2, 2019. Accessed: Aug. 8, 2019.
