00:00In my 61 years, I have worked in the U.S. House and the U.S. Senate, built and grown
00:08businesses.
00:09I've created a charitable foundation for early childhood development, chaired a human
00:14rights agency, started a small business tech incubator, and built a museum.
00:20But there's no job, no job, that I've had that I've been more honored to hold than
00:26being your governor.
00:33In eight years as the leader of this state, through the good times and the bad, there hasn't
00:40been a day when I woke up and wished that I was doing something different.
00:44Along the way of running the state, I seem to have picked up a few habits.
00:50You can call them good or bad habits.
00:52But, for example, I now regularly make the mistake of reading the comments by the online
00:58trolls.
01:00Yeah, I know I shouldn't do it, although I care about them a lot less than I used to.
01:06I once had my speech get a little bit wet during my first campaign and got stymied because I
01:12couldn't get the pages unstuck.
01:13So now, every time I have a speech, I crumple it up so that I can move the pages around
01:20on
01:20the podium.
01:22When I get nervous in the middle of a speech, I pick the kindest face in the crowd.
01:30And then I deliver the entire speech only to that person.
01:34Probably very uncomfortable for that person.
01:39And when I'm having a political argument with someone and I'm not winning, I've figured
01:44out that if I offer them a shot of Malort, it can make a whole big lot of difference.
01:53But the best habit, the very best habit that I've picked up over the last few years is that
01:58I take a long walk every single day.
02:02When I'm in Springfield, I walk around Washington Park.
02:05When I'm in Chicago, I walk along the lakefront often or the Bloomingdale Trail.
02:09When I'm in DuCoin, I walk around the state fairgrounds there.
02:13Beautiful.
02:14I walk when it's warm and I walk when it's cold.
02:17I'm an early riser.
02:19You can ask my staff.
02:22They get texts from me at 4.30 in the morning.
02:24They don't like that at all.
02:26But I'm out there every day when the sun starts peeking over the horizon and Illinois
02:32is just waking up.
02:35Walking forces me to literally touch grass.
02:40And what's great is that on my walks, when people see me, they just say, hey, JB, not
02:47hello, Governor.
02:50And these are mostly total strangers.
02:52Teachers.
02:53But I love that they just call me by my first name.
02:56That's who I am.
02:57Sometimes it's a running club asking to take a selfie with me.
03:01Sometimes it's a new parent pushing a stroller aching for some adult conversation with nearly
03:08anyone, even if it's the governor.
03:11Sometimes it's someone with a complaint.
03:13Sometimes it's someone with a compliment.
03:17But inevitably what happens is that I'll hear someone say my name and I'll look around
03:22and find them.
03:23And I'll see a fellow Illinoisan who's just starting their day too.
03:28And they'll briefly chat with me like a neighbor because that's what I am.
03:36When I started taking these daily walks, it was originally just for my physical health.
03:43And frankly, it seemed like it would be a lot of drudgery.
03:46But in short order, I've found that my walks are the very best thing that I've ever done
03:51for my mental health.
03:52to center me for the work ahead.
03:56That's important.
03:58Because somehow, over this last decade of American politics, we seem to have lost the
04:05cord that once kept society together.
04:09The expectation that even if we disagree, we owe each other some kindness and compassion.
04:16Computer screens seem to have become a weapon of cruelty.
04:19And the only cure, for me anyway, is finding time to talk to people in person, face to face.
04:27Chatting with people on my walks is a reminder that politics isn't what drives most people.
04:33That the sun rises every morning and with it rise people who don't care what party you
04:39come from.
04:40And they don't care what country you come from or what religion you believe in.
04:45They just want someone to make their life a little bit easier.
04:49And when I meet those people, when I shake their hands and I listen to their stories and
04:53I look them in the eye, when they laugh or they cry or they yell, it makes me want to
05:01make their lives a whole lot better.
05:05That desire has helped me develop another very important habit.
05:09I don't sugarcoat the truth.
05:12During the darkest days of the COVID pandemic, I learned that the best thing that I could
05:17do during my daily press conferences was just tell people what was happening, good and bad.
05:24And I've found that no matter how difficult the truth is to hear, it's so much better than
05:30being lied to.
05:38And right now in this country we are being lied to every single day.
05:45So here's the truth, plain and simple.
05:49Our state is under siege.
05:53Not by protesters, not by immigrants, not by the deep state, not by the press, not by Canada
06:00or Mexico or Greenland, not by Antifa or by Jewish space lasers or pride parades.
06:10No, no, our state is under siege by a petty, corrupt man in Washington.
06:18A man who ran for president because he wanted to live in a palace and get rich or get richer.
06:27Our state is under siege by the skilled sycophants who surround that president and use his base
06:34desires as cover for their own destructive agendas.
06:39Our state is under siege by the many, many Republicans who are either too infatuated or
06:46too frightened to fight Donald Trump for the people they serve.
06:51And I mean Republicans like Darren Bailey.
06:56You can be a lot of things and still be an effective governor, but one thing you cannot
07:01be is a coward.
07:07And right now, Darren Bailey and the Republican Party are deathly afraid of reality.
07:14Gas prices are high.
07:16Why?
07:16Because Donald Trump took us to war in Iran and Venezuela.
07:21Meat and fruit and beer and cars cost more today than they ever have.
07:26Why?
07:27Because Trump insisted on imposing tariffs and going into trade wars.
07:33Farms are going under and businesses tied to those farms are laying off workers because
07:37President Trump started a trade war that had no greater purpose than a few cable news hits.
07:44The state of Illinois is facing its most difficult budget decisions in a decade because President
07:51Trump has to, well, he went and cut SNAP benefits and money to local hospitals and FEMA reimbursements
08:00for storm damage.
08:03Disaster money taken away by Donald Trump.
08:07Darren Bailey would have you believe that you can be governor of this great state without
08:12confronting any damage that Donald Trump has done to our economy or our democracy.
08:17He's running a campaign that treats Trump like Voldemort, someone whose name he will
08:23not speak.
08:25But let me tell you another truth.
08:27This president is trying to break this country.
08:32through Republican and Democratic administrations over so many years, through war and famine
08:39and flood and plague, we have, well, existed with a common moral framework that says that
08:46we try in the best and most equitable way possible to lift each other up.
08:51He's trying to destroy that.
08:55An ideology that rejects that compact is poisonous and it's dangerous and it comes with terrifying
09:02real world consequences.
09:05I have to worry about whether people can eat lettuce or blueberries off a grocery shelf because
09:11Trump is doing away with food inspections.
09:15I have to track measles outbreaks because the president put a madman in charge of vaccines.
09:21recommendations.
09:24I have to monitor the movements of ICE agents because he handed guns to people who couldn't
09:29pass a background check, frankly, to work in an animal shelter.
09:37I have to find money that we don't have to fight problems that didn't exist before Donald
09:43Trump.
09:46It's the reality of being a governor in America today.
09:49I'm not the only one.
09:52the question you need to ask yourself is do you want someone in this job who has the
09:57courage to confront reality or do you want someone in this job who thinks that dinosaurs
10:02and humans roamed the earth together?
10:05being governor is about confronting the truth and then getting to work.
10:12Our families, our Illinois families deserve better paying jobs and higher wages.
10:18health care for all, the best public education in the entire nation.
10:28And they deserve a governor who no matter the reality they must work with is going to find
10:34a way to make things better.
10:39When I first ran for governor, Illinois was a national punchline.
10:44No kidding.
10:45Our credit rating was heading toward bankruptcy.
10:48We had billions in unpaid bills.
10:51Our human services had been hollowed out.
10:54Our roads and our bridges and our airports were crumbling.
10:57And Springfield was paralyzed by a man who hated unions and wanted to destroy government.
11:03So I rolled up my sleeves and I got to work.
11:06And you know what?
11:07We've balanced the budget every year.
11:15And as of three days ago, we had gotten 10 credit upgrades.
11:20As of today, we have an 11th credit upgrade.
11:25And we saved taxpayers hundreds of millions of dollars in interest payments as a result.
11:31We put more money in the pockets of working families by raising the minimum wage to a living
11:36wage, guaranteeing universal paid leave for our workers, and lowering taxes for families
11:44with kids.
11:46That's how you do it.
11:48We have smaller class sizes in Illinois and hired more teachers.
11:52And Illinois schools are now ranked fifth best in the nation.
12:00I've invested in police and mental health care and substance use treatment, which has
12:06led to lower crime rates and better public safety.
12:10And I've attracted new companies and jobs to Illinois, making us number two in the nation
12:15for corporate expansions.
12:20Now, I know and you know, we have a lot more work to do.
12:25And Christian Mitchell and I have a bold vision to confront a world where change is accelerating.
12:31We need elected officials who can stand up to the enriched and the entrenched, stand up to
12:38the wealthy and the well-connected, who are not owned by the special interests.
12:43We need to be willing to reimagine the old social contract because it's broken.
12:51We cannot tell children anymore that as long as you go to work and work hard, learn a skill
12:56and find a job, well, then you'll be able to pay off your debt and afford a house and buy
13:01a car and go on vacation every once in a while.
13:03Well, we can't.
13:05Hoping that corporate tycoons and tech billionaires will find their better angels and help mend
13:11the society that they broke is not a strategy.
13:14It's an empty slogan.
13:17We must recenter the conversation on the everyday Americans who get up every morning and try
13:22their best to make do with what they have.
13:25We're holding it together with duct tape and string.
13:30And who are asking their leaders to honestly confront one fundamental question.
13:36Is life really just about getting up, going to work and grinding it out until you die?
13:42Or do we owe each other something better, something more?
13:48I believe as governor, I owe you something more.
13:53And your governor should believe that.
13:55And I am willing to fight like hell to get it.
14:04I'm willing to wield the truth like a weapon.
14:08And I'm willing to confront people in my own party who are too feckless to fight.
14:13And I'm willing to confront the people in the Republican Party who are too cruel to lead.
14:25And look, I'm going to keep getting up every morning and taking my walks.
14:29And I'm going to keep loving this job and the people of this great state.
14:32And I'm going to keep fighting for kindness, for compassion, for courage and for truth, for you and for your
14:42families and for your friends and for our future.
14:47So I have just one question for you, Illinois Democrats, are you ready for the fight?
14:54No, really, are you ready for the fight?
14:57Thank you, St. Clair County, let's get out there and fight like hell for another four years!
15:03S. Clair County, let's get out there and the people of T. Clair County, let's get out there!
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