https://www.realclearpolitics....s_office_147110.html

The more we learn about the Jenny Thornley affair, the more it appears that senior members of the Pritzker administration, including potentially the governor and his wife, may have facilitated a fraud on the state by a now-indicted former campaign aide to enrich her and then obstructed efforts to bring her to justice.

This is a tangled web, so stay with me as I set forth a timeline of events and characters, according to the Chicago Tribune.

The former executive director of the Illinois State Police Merit Board, Jack Garcia, discovered evidence that one of the employees under his direction, Jenny Thornley, was stealing money from the people of the state

Garcia is a well-known, skilled investigator who previously supervised the divisions of internal investigations and forensic services, before becoming the first deputy director of the Illinois State Police. Thornley was a campaign aide for Gov. J.B. Pritzker (her husband, Jared, was also a senior political appointee at the Illinois comptroller’s office) and close enough to Pritzker and his wife, M.K., that she had their personal telephone numbers.

After assembling the evidence and building the case, Garcia scheduled meetings to fire Thornley and refer her for prosecution on the morning of Feb. 3, 2020. However, on the eve of that day, Thornley contacted (at least) the governor's wife (pictured, at left) and asked her to intervene, alleging that Garcia had assaulted her sexually a week or so earlier.

The governor’s chief counsel promptly called the merit board (which is an independent agency created “to remove political influence” from State Police hiring, promotion and discipline) to “advise” it to: (a) cancel her firing and the referral for prosecution, (b) suspend Garcia (the experienced investigator who uncovered the Thornley fraud) and (c) retain an outside counsel proposed by the governor’s office. The merit board went along, but also suspended Thornley, and Garcia voluntarily took and passed a lie detector test.

Then Thornley sued to stop the investigation of her own claim of sexual harassment.

The outside counsel, Christina Egan, nonetheless completed an investigation by July 2020 (at the cost of $500,000 paid by the people of Illinois), confirming the evidence Garcia assembled that Thornley had stolen money and committed forgery, and finding no evidence of Thornley’s sexual assault allegation. The State Police Merit Board then reinstated Garcia, fired Thornley, referred her for prosecution. She has now been indicted for theft and forgery.

However, after Thornley was fired, someone with clout in the Pritzker administration somehow granted her disability payments reserved for people that are actually state employees. These payments (amounting to some $71,000) went on for more than a year, ending days before she was indicted for theft and fraud. These extensive payments were for “injuries'' sustained from an “assault” that Egan determined had not occurred.

From the Tribune: “The merit board unsuccessfully called on the executive inspector general to investigate Thornley’s workers’ comp claim and then turned to anti-fraud investigators at the Illinois Department of Insurance. Brad Lucchini, assistant deputy director of the agency’s fraud unit, called the Thornley matter a ‘clear case of fraud,’ according to a July 27 memo to Garcia written by Emily Fox, the merit board’s program director.” But, apparently the investigators did nothing.

Indeed, no one did anything about Thornley’s disability payments until days before another agency (outside the Pritzker Administration’s control) indicted her in September 2021.

In the meantime, someone in the Pritzker administration worked with Democrat members in the legislature to insert — in the middle of the night, moments before it was passed – a provision into legislation to fire Jack Garcia. He was actually fired by the Democrat-controlled Illinois legislature!

Then, just a few weeks ago after Thornley was indicted, the administration removed two members of the five-member merit board, including the chairman who oversaw much of this investigation and who had been appointed by Pritzker himself in 2019.

This fact pattern raises numerous questions with respect to theft and fraud perpetrated on the people of Illinois and an apparent pattern of obstruction of justice.

1) Who effectuated Thornley’s enrollment in the disability program over the objections of the merit board — and on whose orders did that person or persons act?

2) Why did the inspector general refuse to look into this blatant abuse? What role has the attorney general played — what were his or his staff’s communications with the governor and his staff?

3) What did the governor, Mrs. Pritzker and their staff do, and when did they do it, to help Jenny Thornley? Did they continue to protect her even after Egan's independent investigation affirmed the evidence of her theft and forgery?

4) What did the administration know about the evidence assembled by Garcia that has led to Thornley’s indictment before it intervened on her behalf over Super Bowl weekend in 2020? Was any of this information considered, along with the timing of the claim, before intervening to stop her from being fired and being immediately referred for prosecution?

The Tribune story also puts a further gloss on the curious late-night insertion of language in a legislative bill to cause the dismissal of the distinguished Jack Garcia from his position at the merit board, as well as the dismissal in October of the merit board chairman who oversaw the investigation into these matters. Is this a campaign of retribution against fraud fighters?

This smells like another episode in Illinois' unfortunately long history of political corruption and shenanigans.

Did high government officials actively facilitate and participate in obstruction of justice and fraud by and with Thornley, at the cost of hundreds of thousands of our tax dollars? Did Democrat legislators participate, wittingly or unwittingly, in a Pritzker campaign to “get” fraud fighters because they uncovered and pursued fraud by someone close to the first family?

The people have a right to know.

Something always stinks in Illinois. Nothing new here. I have a friend who has a shitload of dirty little secrets from when he was in a high position in the state. I keep trying to get him to send what he knows to a good reporter.

Nothing new here, business as usual.

Thornley has some dirt on the Pritzkers is my guess.

I suspect Pritzker will continue the tradition of former Illinois Governors being imprisoned.

We can only hope that J.B. ends up in the Governor’s ward in Illinois state prison!

Corruption in the Illinois Government?

That's what we call a "Tuesday".

(Meaning, nothing unusual, just a regular day)

In fairness, that's what happens there. You get elected Gov and then later end up making license plates in the state pen.

Illinois is the most corrupt State in the world bar none. But I guess that's ok because the people in Illinois elect and then re-elect the same people who allow the corruption to flourish. Keep the name Pritzker in your memory bank because this guy is not going to be happy as a mere Governor. His ultimate goal is the White House.

quote:

Originally posted by Bulldog7972:
Illinois is the most corrupt State in the world bar none.

In the U.S., likely.
In North America, maybe.
But in the world? Not even in the top 20.

quote:

Originally posted by YooperSigs:
Thornley has some dirt on the Pritzkers is my guess.

Bingo!

quote:

Originally posted by Sig2340:

quote:

Originally posted by Bulldog7972:
Illinois is the most corrupt State in the world bar none.

In the U.S., likely.
In North America, maybe.
But in the world? Not even in the top 20.

North America includes Mexico, so it’s not even top 20 in that classification. Slacking, y’know.

Illinois has just adopted a new state motto:

"Our Governors Make Our License Plates"

quote:

Originally posted by Bulldog7972:
Illinois is the most corrupt State in the world bar none. But I guess that's ok because the people in Illinois elect and then re-elect the same people who allow the corruption to flourish. Keep the name Pritzker in your memory bank because this guy is not going to be happy as a mere Governor. His ultimate goal is the White House.

No, the people of Chicago keep electing these morons. The city of Chicago has more votes then the total of the lands south of I80.

Most of them go to Oxford FCI in Wisconsin. Blago got to go to Colorado. Don't forget Pritzker is more than wealthy.

quote:

Originally posted by Bulldog7972:
Illinois is the most corrupt State in the world bar none. But I guess that's ok because the people in Illinois elect and then re-elect the same people who allow the corruption to flourish. Keep the name Pritzker in your memory bank because this guy is not going to be happy as a mere Governor. His ultimate goal is the White House.

Moving up the chain, Chicago style.
That would make President the second job he has held (Tried to buy a job as US Senator from Blago, but we won't count that). Sound familiar, OBAMA?
Community organizer, then Senator, then President.

Seems the Priztkers weren't particularly shocked by her crimes, but only that she was caught. Like all good Illinois politicians, they took care of their own. Contrast this with the political ads coming out of Pritzker's mammoth ass about how great things are in Illinois because of his stewardship.

Everyone knows he bribed up Mike Madigan to get the nomination, a pretty much sure thing to get into office in Illinois.

quote:

Originally posted by Bulldog7972:
Illinois is the most corrupt State in the world bar none. But I guess that's ok because the people in Illinois elect and then re-elect the same people who allow the corruption to flourish. Keep the name Pritzker in your memory bank because this guy is not going to be happy as a mere Governor. His ultimate goal is the White House.

As long as the welfare checks come and the EBT cards get filled, they just vote as they're told.

quote:

Originally posted by Flash-LB:
Illinois has just adopted a new state motto:

"Our Governors Make Our License Plates"

That is actually a really old motto. There have been 3 in my life time that have gone to jail for corruption.

quote:

No, the people of Chicago keep electing these morons. The city of Chicago has more votes then the total of the lands south of I80.

Most of Illinois is a beautiful, mostly conservative place... but in an abusive relationship with Chicago.