We’ve paid down more than $12 billion in debt, eliminated the old bill backlog, and grown our Rainy Day Fund from near zero to more than $2.5 billion. We have given Illinois a stronger financial cushion to protect taxpayers, invest, and grow even during hard times.

Today my 16 year old and I were having lunch out, and a group of young men at the table behind us were loudly joking around and reminiscing about high school high jinks. One of them said “I’m sure we would have gone to States that year. Our defense cooked…that’s the one thing I really regret” and they started talking about their high school sports team and how good it was. Of course, there were enormous tragedies during the lockdown, but there was so much stolen from kids that is just not talked about and it was all for nothing. It still infuriates me.

California’s Billionaire Wealth Tax: Healthcare vs. Greed On November 3rd, at a time of unprecedented income and wealth inequality, the people of California will decide whether to pass a 5% wealth tax on more than 200 billionaires in California who are worth $2.2 trillion. This initiative, known as Proposition 40, would raise enough revenue to prevent 3 million working-class Californians from losing the healthcare they currently have as a result of Trump’s so-called Big Beautiful Bill. Last year, these billionaires became $500 billion richer. As a result of a rigged tax code, they pay a lower effective tax rate than a plumber or a nurse. The greed of these billionaires is really extraordinary. Instead of paying their fair share of taxes, billionaires are now spending $229 million — 0.01% of their wealth — to oppose a 5% tax on their wealth. The effort against this initiative is being led by the 4th wealthiest man in the world, Sergey Brin, the co-founder of Google, who is spending over $100 million to defeat it. If the California billionaire wealth tax is passed, Mr. Brin would owe $13.5 billion more in taxes. But don't feel sorry for him. He would still have $256.5 billion left over to feed his family. (And don’t let him fool you into thinking he left the state. Mr. Brin owns at least four mansions in California worth some $103.5 million. Tax experts have made it clear that he would owe this tax.) It is also being opposed by Mark Zuckerberg, Larry Page, Larry Ellison, Eric Schmidt and Peter Thiel. These 5 Big Tech billionaires are worth over $646 billion combined. Dangerously, many oligarchs today believe that they have the divine right to rule and that they are masters of the universe. They live lives completely separate from ordinary people and are obsessed with becoming even richer and more powerful than they already are. The result: They would rather let people in California suffer or die because they can’t afford to go to a doctor than pay their fair share of taxes. Let's be clear: These billionaires have more money than they could spend in over 100 lifetimes. How many mansions do they need? How many yachts do they need? How many private jets do they need? So today I say to the billionaire class: Control your greed. Show a bit of compassion to working families and their kids in California. Instead of spending $229 million on TV ads against this wealth tax, I have a better idea: Start paying your fair share of taxes. In 1933, Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis said: “We can have democracy in this country, or we can have great wealth concentrated in the hands of a few, but we cannot have both.” What Justice Brandeis said was accurate 93 years ago. It is even more accurate today. Our job now is to tell the Oligarchs in California that we will no longer tolerate their insatiable greed. We will choose healthcare for working families and their children over obscene wealth for the richest people in the world. Let us stand together in solidarity. They have the money. We have the people. Let's win this struggle.

The problem with conservatives blaming “teachers unions” is that the same unions represent teachers at the “successful” schools. This is just a conservative version of the liberal myth of underfunded schools. It’s not the unions, guys.

NYC Climate Week opens with an invitation to ‘smash a data center' piñata gothamist.com/news/nyc-clima…

No more “no tax on data centers” politico.com/live-updates/20…

"Rental markets strengthened, particularly in NYC where rents topped new records. A contact noted that many prospective buyers of luxury properties in NYC shifted to the rental market following a proposed new tax on high-value 2nd homes, despite the proposal being paused"