Rep. Barb Wheeler: "House has been turned into a circus"

Furious over legislative action that has brought key pieces of Gov. Bruce Rauner’s agenda to the House floor, a GOP lawmaker yesterday hit the process as a “circus.”

State Rep. Barbara Wheeler (R-Crystal Lake) fumed on Thursday over House Speaker Michael Madigan’s recent maneuvers to shift legislative discussion on Rauner’s Turnaround Agenda priorities and budget plan from closed-door “working groups” and to move action to the House floor.

Wheeler labeled a Right-to-Work bill called for a House vote by Madigan, a measure modeled after the governor’s own “Right-to-Work” proposal, as “phony legislation” and the exercise as an “extraneous vote.”

“My constituents sent me to Springfield to right the sinking ship that is the financial situation of our state,” said Wheeler. “Instead, for the second straight week the House has been turned into a circus with lopsided committees of the whole and doomed bills that are disrupting the progress we have been making in negotiations toward a budget deal.” Read more in the Illinois Observer