Lake County Gazette

Bull Valley businessman and Republican candidate for governor Gary Rabine has a vision for Illinois that goes back to the days of what it used to be.

“I’ve seen Illinois go from being the best place to build a business to being one of the worst,” Rabine said at a recent Get Together event hosted by the Antioch Republicans and posted to Facebook. “When we look at our policy for workmen’s compensation it’s one of the worst three in the country. When we look at taxation today, we have the highest real estate taxes in the country, a terrible thing. In that time from 2007 to today, our property values have gone down. Other states don’t have these problems.”

Rabine insist his run for governor is all about changing the direction here in Illinois.

 “I’m friends with a bunch of governors doing a great job bringing jobs to their states and I look at our state and we’re doing everything we can to push job creators out, to push opportunity out to push our kids out,” he added. “I can’t tell my kids this is the place you must stay to build your family to build a business but I’m going to be able to tell them that. My slogan is paving the way to stay.”

Rabine has largely built his platform on the job of rebuilding the state economy.

“You go over to the South Side or the West Side, and you're going to see some people say in certain areas 30, 40 percent black unemployment,” he previously told the North Cook News. “It's a huge problem. And when we abandon a community like we have in the urban environments of Chicago, it's a sin.”

Rabine said much of the battle lies in reforming the system and crushing all the crippling property taxes.

“We’re not serving our families in Illinois anymore,” he added. “If we were we wouldn’t be passing some of these policing laws. We’re letting unions control everything and that’s got to stop.”

On the campaign trail, Rabine has also been vocal about the lockdowns enacted by Gov. J.B. Pritzker as a defense mechanism against the spread of COVID-19. He said he’s convinced it’s more than mere coincidence that the states where the shutdowns were most stringently imposed also had the most violence.

He insists under his direction things will be different.

“Job creation, crushing property taxes by 50% or more by 2024 and servicing the family like we haven’t done in a long time, that’s what we’re about,” he added. We do those things and we’ll be paving the way to stay.”