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Illinois House of Representatives 52nd District candidate Martin McLaughlin answered Shaw Local’s election questionnaire for the Illinois House primary election.
Voting ends for the primary election on the evening of June 28.
Full Name: Martin McLaughlin
What office are you seeking? State Representative 52nd District
What offices, if any, have you previously held? State Representative 52nd District 2021- present
Village President, Barrington Hills 2012-2021
City: Barrington Hills, Illinois
Occupation: Pension Investment Manager
Education: Illinois Wesleyan University, Bachelors in Business Administration
Campaign Website: www.MartyForIllinois.com
What are the top issues facing your district and what would you like to do to address those issues?
Protection of Parental Rights in healthcare and school settings
Taxes - stopping and/or lowering the increasing tax burden on families, retirees and businesses
Inflation - need to stop the unregulated spending and overtaxing by government
If COVID-19 hospitalizations and deaths rise again, what mitigations, if any, should the state pursue?
The state should never again allow a single individual using never-ending emergency executive orders to overrule local, county and state elected officials from making their own decisions. Leaders should solicit and accept more input, not less during a time of crisis. The state legislature should have been consulted by the Governor to determine appropriate action.
In light of Michael Madigan’s indictment, what steps should the legislature take to address corruption and ethics concerns in the state?
1). The legislature should not allow political contributions to pay for the legal defense of any elected official.
2). An elected official should not be able to head a political party’s state organization while holding public office. It concentrates too much influence on a single person, leading to corruption.
3). Term limits for any state office should be no more than eight years.
If there was one bill that you could get through the legislature next year, what would it be?
Any bill that is proposed must be accompanied by a statement of financial impact to the taxpayer. Without such analysis, no bill can be presented, debated or voted upon. Currently, there are many bills which are constructed, presented and debated which have no forecast of cost, no appropriation budgeted for, yet state legislators will waste taxpayers’ time and money running these bills through committee and passing them. It makes no sense if there’s no money for them. These bills are run purely for political purposes - for show and optics only. I’m for accountability and outcomes, not optics.
If there was one recently passed law you could repeal, what would it be?
Unfortunately, there are so many to choose from, but any and all legislation that is too lenient on crime, whether it be the SAFE-T Act or the prohibition of cash bail. Both of those laws compromise public safety and impede the ability of law enforcement to do their jobs to protect us.
Do you support term limits? If yes, why and what would they look like? And if no, why not?
See answer to Mike Madigan corruption question above.
Inflation across the country has greatly impacted the price of gasoline, food and other supplies. What should the legislature do to address these issues?
Stoppage of energy production and the resulting high prices have combined with trillions in stimulus spending to cause rampant inflation.
We should pressure the Federal Government to open up our domestic energy production, increasing supply, which will immediately drive down gas prices. Low energy costs also benefit manufacturers, food producers, construction equipment manufacturers, and so many other industries. Clean energy does not mean cleaning out the wallets of Illinois taxpayers.
Stimulus spending needs to be curtailed, which will help the declining U.S. dollar. Both these measures require a basic understanding of supply and demand, which seems to be missing from the political elites.
Taxes are a top concern of Illinois voters. What do you think the underlying issues are and how would you propose addressing them?
As a person who lowered the tax levy 7 times while Mayor in my town, it’s obvious that efficiency can be implemented at the government level. But it requires those in charge to have the stomach to do it. In Springfield, spending again has outpaced revenues in the most recent budget.
The issue of property taxes can be best addressed at the local level. A quick look at your property tax bill shows dozens of governmental units increasing their tax burden year after year. These local bodies need
break the tradition of automatic compounded annual tax increases.
Each unit always claims “it’s just a little bit more” , but when added all together, these increases have given Illinois taxpayers one of the highest tax burdens in the nation.
What are three things the state legislature could do to promote better fiscal responsibility within state government?
1) We need to provide revenue forecasts prior to presenting the annual budget. That did not happen this year.
2) Each governmental unit should, in a timely manner, be able to produce costs, expenses, and fraud calculations to the legislature. For example, for two years, IDES still is not able to produce the amount of fraudulent payouts of unemployment benefits.
3) Currently, the majority party handles, creates, and reviews the budget without any input or oversight by the other party. Given the super majority in both chambers of the legislature, there is no collaboration between the parties.
How would you propose addressing the problems with the Illinois Department of Children and Family Services?
DCFS is wholly broken and should be dismantled from the bottom up. The safety of children should always be our primary concern. DCFS has an incredibly difficult job for people to do, but there have been so many failures in their attempts to protect our most vulnerable citizens.
What can be done at a state level to address crime?
How about we start by making crime Illegal again? The SAFE-T act should be scrapped. That bill passed over a year ago, limiting certain abilities of the police, which could not have happened at a worse time. States attorneys and judges who are being lenient on criminals, combined with new cashless bail provisions are putting violent criminals immediately back on the streets.
The outcome of these lenient provisions has been significant increases in violent crime, carjackings, theft and many other crimes.
Arresting criminals is just one part of keeping crime down. The court system and the jail system need to act together to keep violent offenders off the streets.
Did Joe Biden win the 2020 election?
As far as I am aware, he does reside at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, and often flies on Air Force One. The Joint Session of the Senate and the House of Representatives confirmed the Electoral College vote which is the requisite for taking office.
What is your position on the Jan. 6, 2021, riot at the U.S. Capitol?
I believe there should be an equal standard applied to all incidents of civil unrest, whether it is protesting a Justice’s confirmation outside the Supreme Court Building on October 6, 2018, or the protests which resulted in the burning of St. John’s Church in D.C. on May 30, 2020, or the protests on January 6, 2021. Criminal trespass, criminal damage to property, arson, trespassing or the breaking of any other laws at these events should all be prosecuted in an equal fashion. Not doing so causes different tiers of justice, which is not what this country was founded upon.
Illinois has seen significant revenue growth from marijuana sales and enhanced gambling. Are there other industries the state should consider to grow revenue?
With the digital age booming and the information data age blossoming, we should continue to explore and expand incentives for businesses to open data centers and information centers throughout Illinois.
We further should look for ways to incentivize industrial businesses, such as ammonia or hydrogen production facilities to come to Illinois.
All of these industries will require reliable low cost energy and a reliable power grid. We should do everything possible to continue to produce and deliver low cost energy in Illinois.