(The Center Square) – A Chicago alderman has proposed a new tax to pay for migrant care after a resident’s rant about city spending went viral.
Jessica Jackson was one in a series of residents who blasted city council members at committee hearings.
“We ain’t taking no disrespect from a bunch of people who have broken into the country and now have completely broke the city,” Jackson said.
Jackson encouraged Democrats to follow former presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and former U.S. Rep. Tulsi Gabbard by leaving the party.
After hearing from angry residents at the Joint Committee Hearing on Immigration and Refugee Rights and Housing and Real Estate, 25th Ward Alderman Byron Sigcho Lopez proposed a November referendum for voters to impose a 3% income tax hike on the wealthy to pay for migrant care.
“We have 120,000 millionaires who live in the city of Chicago who can pay their fair share. And there are solutions so that we can do both: care for new neighbors as well as the current neighbors,” Sigcho Lopez said.
Alderman Sigcho Lopez is a member of the Chicago City Council’s Socialist Caucus.
More than $900 million in state of Illinois taxpayer funds have been budgeted for migrant care in fiscal year 2025. Chicago taxpayers have spent at least $300 million on migrant care.
According to Chicago resident P Rae Easley, it is not fair to residents when the city council spends hundreds of millions of dollars on migrants.
“It is drowning the taxpayer. It is forcing everybody’s rent to go up. It’s forcing everybody’s mortgages to go up, because the property taxes are going up. There is no stoppage for the illegals who are coming up here, because you guys have already magnetized our city,” Easley said.
Chicago is facing a budget deficit of nearly $1 billion.
City Budget Director Annette Guzman announced a series of budget restrictions on Monday, including a citywide hiring freeze and stringent limitations on non-essential travel and overtime. Guzman said in a statement that the restrictions are effective immediately.
