A bill that would allow Indiana lawmakers to explore welcoming in Illinois counties who wish to secede from their state is headed to the governor’s desk.
On Thursday, Indiana House Bill 1008 passed its final legislative hurdle when the measure was approved by the House, which signed off on amendments from the state’s Senate.
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WATCH HEREWith the signature of House Speaker Todd Huston, who had originally proposed the bill, the measure will now head to the desk of Gov. Mike Braun for final approval.
The bill comes as a group of more than 30 Illinois counties have voted on advisory referendums to sever ties with the Land of Lincoln, with the idea of cutting loose from Chicago and Cook County and either forming their own state or having Cook County become its home state.
To that end, the Indiana legislature put together a bill that would establish an “Indiana-Illinois boundary adjustment commission,” exploring the idea of adding those Illinois counties who wish to leave the state into the fold as new Indiana counties.
The bill would aim to create a commission made of five representatives from Indiana and five from Illinois, and would be tasked with evaluating the location of the boundary between the two states, and whether states that wish to leave Illinois would be permitted to be annexed by Indiana.
The measure faces an uncertain future, since the bill requires Illinois to pass similar legislation, an unlikely event given that Democrats hold a supermajority in both chambers of the state’s General Assembly.
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Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker dismissed talk of Indiana taking counties from Illinois as a “stunt.”
"It's not going to happen, he recently said. "But I'll just that say Indiana is a low-wage state that doesn't protect workers, a state that does not provide health care for people when they're in need and so I don't think it's very attractive for anybody in Illinois.”
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SIGN UP In recent years, more than 30 Illinois counties, including Iroquois County, have approved non-binding referendums that sought to determine whether those counties should explore either forming their own state or simply severing ties with Cook County.
Every county that has weighed the non-binding referendum has approved it. The referendum asks county residents whether their officials should coordinate with officials in other counties to explore either having Cook County become its own state, or to severe ties with Illinois.
The reasoning behind the referendums, according to supporters, is that the city of Chicago and Cook County have a sizable impact on the policies enacted by the state legislature, and rural counties share different interests that are not being represented by the actions of the General Assembly.
Many legal experts have expressed skepticism that such an effort would be successful on numerous fronts. To start, Illinois and Indiana legislators would both have to agree on territory that would move between the two states, and if that agreement were to be reached, the U.S. Congress would have to approve the move, as it has final say over all border debates between states.
