Illinois comptroller says legislators won't get pay raise

SPRINGFIELD, Ill. (AP) - Illinois Comptroller Susana Mendoza made known in a video she released Wednesday that state legislators will not be getting raises in the next budget year, which begins July 1.

The issue of a pay raise for legislators came up as they debated budget details in the early-morning hours Sunday. Republican legislators balked at the idea of a raise being included in the state’s approximately $40 billion, coronavirus-challenged spending plan for the next fiscal year.

While there is no language in the budget that prohibits a pay raise, it does not provide any money to cover the cost of a pay raise.

“Here’s how much money the General Assembly appropriated for legislator raises … in this year’s budget: Zero,” Mendoza says in the video. “Which means, here’s how much more money I will be putting in their paychecks this year: Zero.”

Mendoza’s office is being sued by two former Democratic state senators over past budgets that did block cost-of-living raises. Democrats cited that case as the reason similar language was left out in the upcoming budget.