SE Illinois News

State Rep. Darren Bailey (R-Xenia) says downstate small business owners have grown so frustrated with Gov. J.B. Pritzker’s stay-at-home order trying their hands in terms of being able to make a living that they’re holding discussions about reopening despite the decree.

“Some of them are already talking,” Bailey told the SE Illinois News. “I hear they’ve already opened in Woodford County and the city of Marion is getting ready to open up.”

Bailey said tensions were only exacerbated by the governor’s recent decision to extend his stay-at-home order through the end of May as a way of hopefully slowing the spread of COVID-19. More recently, hundreds of protesters took to the streets for demonstrations outside state government buildings in Springfield and downtown Chicago, demanding that the governor put an end to the decree that has forced small businesses across the state to bolt to their doors after the government deemed them nonessential businesses.

“I was at the Springfield demonstration,” Bailey said. “People want to be heard and they want to be able to get back to living their lives.”

In contrast, Bailey said the only thing Pritzker seems concerned about is maintaining control and advancing what he sees as the Democrats’ agenda.

“They want as many people dependent on the government as they can get,” he said. “I expect these protests to continue and intensify in their emotion.”

Bailey recently filed suit challenging Pritzker’s authority in extending his order, with a downstate judge ruling in his favor.   

“The governor seems to think that he can go around the constitution and do things his own way whenever he’s moved to,” Bailey said. “This suit is on behalf of all the people being hurt by his actions and says they have the right to be taken seriously.”