Illinois to halt most payments without budget, Comptroller says

Illinois will stiff its workers, stop paying Medicaid and end school aid if lawmakers don’t pass a budget in the next three weeks, Comptroller Leslie Geissler Munger said.

The lack of a spending plan for the year starting July 1 is increasing pressure on Illinois’s already stressed finances, Munger said in a press conference in Chicago on Wednesday.

The Democrat-controlled legislature and Republican Governor Bruce Rauner failed to agree before the session ended May 31 on how to close a $6.2 billion budget gap for the coming fiscal year. A solution now requires a three-fifths vote rather than a simple majority. The standoff has intensified the financial crisis and heightened the risk of credit downgrades. Bloomberg Business has the story.