(bright music) (dramatic music) - Thanks for joining us on "Capitol View", I'm Fred Martino This week, the University of Chicago is one of many higher education institutions under investigation by the Trump administration over diversity, equity, and inclusion efforts.

Illinois Governor JB Pritzker sp against federal cuts to the Department of Education.

And the Trump administration has pulled grant funding from Illinois fair housing organ that investigate discrimination.

Those stories and much more with Andrew Adams from "Capitol News Illinois" and Kent Redfield, Emeritus Political Science Professor at the University of Illinois Springfield.

Andrew, upfront this week amid a major budget deficit, Governor Pritzker cut an immigrant healthcare program from his proposed budget.

"The Chicago Tribune" told stori of some of those affected.

- Yeah, so the really excellent reporting in the "Tribune", and I'd encourage anyone to go r found that there are folks affected by this program who will lose health insurance because of the proposed cut in Governor Pritzker's plan.

You know, there's an estimated 30,000 people who will lose health insurance because of this proposed cut.

But that has to be weighed again potentially $330 million in savings for the state by not having this program.

And that comes at a very important time for the state, which is facing, you know, a very tight budget year.

For the first, you know, six or seven budgets that Governor Pritzker proposed, it was mostly the good times for budget planning.

There was a lot of federal money coming in from the pandemic, from aid prog from big infrastructure bills.

But for the first time, it's a pretty tight year, meaning they're looking for places to cut.

And this program has been very controversial in Springfield and around the state, both, you know, ideologically, folks opposed to, you know, certain kinds of immigration have used it as a talking point.

And it has been somewhat mismana It has vastly exceeded its initial cost estimates, about four times higher than initially planned.

And like I said, cutting it could save $330 million.

- Yes, it's a very good reporting, as you said, in the "Chicago Tribune", of looking at the impact of this on individuals.

And of course, this may only be the beginning of challenges for the state of Illinois and for the entire country, as there is an expectation that there may be federal cuts to Medicaid as well, which will affect many more people across the country.

Kent, lots of programs, of course, are being affected by Trump administration actions.

And "The Chicago Tribune" reported on this as well, the University of Chicago, one of the schools being investigated for its work on diversity, equity, and inclus What did you learn?

- Well, this is a pretty broad-based effort.

We're talking 50, 60 universitie depending on what particular aspects of this that the Trump administration has been putting their effort on Just for context, we started wit a decision in the Supreme Court that essentially overruled affirmative action, and basically in terms of admiss And that basically was just that it was higher ed admissions.

Now with the new Trump administration, we've kind of, and their efforts to cut back or eliminate diversity, equity, inclusion, which are initiatives that go wa just admissions kinds of issues in terms of who gets into the un But then what are your programs academically, student life?

I mean, it's very broad.

And so you have these executive on top of the decision that dealt just with college adm And now we're projecting that ou what universities have been doin not only in terms of admissions, but then in terms of their hiring program, student groups within the univer And then there's a third aspect which is with the student unrest the protests involving the attack by Hamas and the war in Gaza.

And there is a lot of attention being applied, you know, focused on how have universities dealt with protests and the issues of antisemitism?

And so you've really got a whole bunch of things up in the air without, you know, a lot of clarification.

Although now the Department of E is starting to specify exactly how they want to see this genera you know, thrust of decisions applied to universities.

And so we're not only looking at admissions programs, like there's a private group that funds minority students to attend college in business ar and universities have pardoned with this group.

But the Department of Education is calling into question about whether or not that's appr for universities to pardon with that is providing support specifically to minority student And so, you know, it relates to academic programs, it relates to antisemitism issues in terms of, you know, what are your rules and regulations involving protests, free speech?

And then is this, in terms of tr the general initiatives about removing diversity, equity and inclusion programs in a more general sense and putting pressure on universities to do that.

Then we now have decisions invol is it appropriate for the university to provide support and physical space for a Black student union, which have been, you know, activities and groups that have a long history of presence on college campuses.

And so-- - Thank you for the context on this, Kent, because people need to understan that in addition to the investig these actions are having a sweeping effect across the country as institutions even that are not under investigation are making changes, eliminating positions, eliminating programs, even eliminating certain words which they may fear might spark like diversity, which is a word, of course, that is something that we try and strive in education to advan We advance diversity in every fo But there are efforts to elimina from publications, websites, pro that are of a positive nature.

And it is truly extraordinary, especially when you consider we're only talking about the last few months, the amount of changes.

And Andrew, I need to move on to the next step, which is the, again, another nature of how extraordinary this is.

Amid the investigations, the Trump administration is also dismantling the entire Department of Educati Illinois has joined a multi-state lawsuit over this.

And Andrew, as you know, Governor Pritzker recently addressed the issue.

Tell us more.

- Yeah, so Illinois has joined in a 20-state lawsuit, 20 states and the District of Co in opposing, you know, these mas to the Department of Education.

The lawsuit basically outlines, you know, that these states, they're just not gonna be able to enforce the law, particularly with regards to civil rights requirements, making sure that, you know, everyone gets treated fairly in They say that without oversight and funding from the Department of Education, these laws will go unenforced.

And there just won't be a good answer on how to handle that.

Now, the actual department, you there's some concern about how this will affect funding, you know, because it's a major p in the education space.

But it's not a major funder, if that makes sense.

So in Illinois, the Department of Education makes up about 12% of school spe So, you know, it's not missing half of the budget, but it certainly is a significant portion.

And like you said, Governor Pritzker has voiced his opinion on this subject.

Now, Governor Pritzker, often floated as a potential 2028 presidential candidate, sometimes gets very closely watched for his comments on national issues like this.

And he called the folks supporting this initiative, if I'm remembering right, "Boot-lickers and DOGE-bags," referring to the Department of Government Efficiency.

- Yeah, he is one of the most outspoken Democrats with a national profile.

It is quite stunning.

And again, another thing that from a political sense we will have to watch, not only in terms of the efforts that may eventually be underway for what you just referenced, which is 2028.

But also will that involve any retaliation in the future against Illinois because of this outspoken nature?

Clearly there are other folks who are quite concerned about being outspoken right now, even there have been folks sayin analysts saying that people feel they have to be very careful.

So it's fascinating, really, but also very scary, I would say - Absolutely, I'd say you're rig And Illinois being a very blue s with a governor who's independently wealthy, doesn't have to rely too much on, you know, public donations for his political career, very insulated from some of those effects.

But like you said, you know, with so much federal funding coming to the state, the president has a history of withholding federal funding for any number of reasons.

And that could be-- - And we-- And that's where we move now actually, Andrew.

Kent, in yet another impact from Trump administration action the federal government has pulled grant funding from Illinois fair housing organ that investigate discrimination.

Tell us more.

- Yeah, this is a direct impact of the efforts to cut government costs.

The Department of, you know, Government Efficiency, Elon Musk, DOGE, you know, we have a cut or an elimination of a grant program that's been around since the '80 going to not-for-profits that help people pursue complaints involving, you know, housing discrimination on, you know, race, sex, gender, disability, all of those sorts of things.

And so this is not some kind of investigation.

This is an action that was taken with money that was appropriated by Congress for a specific purpose, and the president, through the D is asserting that, you know, he can pick and choose.

He does not have to spend money that's appropriated for a particular purpose.

And so, you know, this has a big impact on one particular area, you know, trying to enforce the federal and the state law involving housing discrimination But it is, you know, indicative of the things that have been going on in it seems like forever, but it's been a relatively short period of time that the president has been in o to try to make huge cuts in the federal budget, in spending, in order to make the amounts, you know, balance and to have the kind of money that they need to finance some major, you know, tax cuts that they would like to see get So you know, it's a local impact It's certainly an important poli But you know, the larger context is this is a fight between the president and, you know, people that belie that they had an authorization and appropriation from Congress to pursue activities, that the president is refusing to spend the money.

And, you know, we're in court, and this is just stay tuned.

And we'll see, you know, who win what's a really, you know, major, significant battle.

- Yes, yes.

And as the courts work this out, you know, the money is being tak So there is an immediate impact.

And very concerning to people in many areas of life around the country.

Andrew, we return now to the sta and an idea to raise more fundin amid all of this uncertainty with the federal government, and also the deficit the state has been facing.

You can play the Illinois lotter sports betting is online, and now there is a proposal for other online gambling.

Tell us more.

- Yeah, so this is an interestin Online gambling, it's sometimes called iGaming or iGambling is basically allowing kind of an you might encounter at a casino to be played online.

Currently there are some pretty tight restrictions on what is and isn't allowed vir The whole list is basically what you said.

You can use an online sports book like FanDuel or DraftKing or play the state lottery.

But most other gambling is restr to in-person venues like casinos or video gaming machines, those kind of slot-like machines you might see at a gas station o You know, currently the state's gambling economy generates about $2 billion worth of tax revenue every year, which is pretty significant, particularly after the state hiked tax rates for sports betting last year.

Proponents of this idea of legalizing online gambling, which includes some of the big c behind the online sports betting say that it could generate another $1 billion in state revenue.

But there are some concerns that one, that number might not be as high as they say, and two, it might not be worth i There's a concern that legalizing online gambling would cannibalize the current re meaning if everyone in the state has, let's say, a $500 budget to gamble every year, they're not going to magically have $200 extra to add to online casinos.

They'll just say, "Okay, well, I'll spend $200 less on the lottery," or whatever their game of choice And there's also a concern that legalizing online gambling would increase the rates of problem gambling, make more people gamble money that they might not necessarily Over the past few years since we legalized online sports an average amount, like the per capita amount of money spent on gambling has increased from $360-ish to more than $500 per person in the state.

And that is a number that not everyone is comfortable with.

- That's interesting, yeah.

- It'll be interesting.

- It'll be very fascinating to w and see what they do, because there certainly is a need for revenue, but you don't really know where it will lead.

And would it even take money away from casinos?

You know, we just don't know.

Kent, sticking with technology developments, artificial intelligence, AI is moving into so many areas of our lives, but there is some real grave con over AI's influence on healthcar And bills dealing with AI in online therapy and health ins have advanced in House committee Tell us more.

- Yeah, so artificial intelligen obviously has exploded in terms of its impact on people And everybody seems to be using, you know, chatbots and those sorts of thin Healthcare, these bills address a couple of specific things.

One has to do with whether or no you can use artificial intellige in terms of online mental health treatment.

And so the concern is that you c you're having some kind of healt and you're not talking to a pers you're talking to a chat bot that has algorithms that are trying to deal with, you know, whatever you're presenting there, trying to get some help.

And you know, no one, I don't be thinks that the technology has gotten to the place where you can, you know, actually replace the doctor in terms of making decisions.

The other bill has to do with al that are being used to evaluate insurance claims.

You know, can something be covered, can we pay for this?

And a question here is if you've got an algorithm that is, you know, weighted towards the concerns of the insurance company rather than the patient, you're going to get a systematic in terms of the way that it's de And so how we should regulate AI you know, where government, state and federal, should be stepping in.

But you know, this is not going it's just gonna expand.

- That's right.

So it's good to see the interest and we'll see where those bills and what their effect will be.

It'll be fascinating to watch.

We only have about three minutes And Andrew, we get to end with y with a report of progress.

What a relief after all those other stories.

"Capitol News Illinois" wrote about improvements to the online licensing system for certain professions.

- Yes, so there are a lot of licensed professions in Illinois, so you might need a state license to, you know, teach or be a nail technician or any number of other, you know, fields of work.

And in let's say 2023, the director of the state agency responsible for the licensing said that the backlog of people applying for a state license in, you know, their field, was at crisis levels.

It was just absolutely, you know, terrible to get through that process.

Part of this was because of the and just knock-on effects of very quickly transitioning from a paper-based system to now it's the pandemic and we're not sure that that's the best idea.

So the state said, okay, set up this online system to, you know, have a quicker, more efficient way to get through these application And over the past year or so, they've set that system up and started rolling it out.

They started with psychologists, music therapists, and nail technicians, and now they're expanding to all of the other professions that they license as they get ready in each particular field.

And by all accounts, it's going fairly well.

A state lawmaker who, you know, has been around the block, he's been doing state policy stuff for 15 years, said that he had basically never seen anything roll out this well, and called it, if I'm remembering correctly, surreal that it was just working Which is, you know, always good when a state policy like this to make it more efficient actually rolls out without a big So we'll see if it continues.

They have a lot of professions left to go.

- Yeah, well, and good to see, 'cause we talked about that for a long time that it was a major problem and people were very frustrated.

So it's good to see the progress and good to end this show talking about progress.

Kent and Andrew, as always, great to speak with both of you.

Thank you both for being with us - Thank you.

- Thank you.

Thank you for making our work po That is "Capitol View".

For everyone at WSIU, I'm Fred M Have a great week.

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