AG Raoul defends state from Trump

Attorney general confronts feds on immigration, reproductive health, Obamacare, census, environment, EtO

Attorney General Kwame Raoul addresses the City Club of Chicago Monday at the Union League Club. (One Illinois/Ted Cox)

By Ted Cox

CHICAGO — Calling it “perhaps the most important time to be a state attorney general,” Kwame Raoul said Monday that he is confronting the Trump administration on several issues critical to Illinois residents.

“We perceive the urgency of this moment,” Raoul said in explaining his actions taken in concert with other attorneys general against what they regard as overreaching federal initiatives. “When the actions of the federal government threaten the people of the state of Illinois and the rule of law in general, it is my duty to work with those attorneys general who are like-minded and stand against those threats.”

In a luncheon address to the City Club of Chicago held Monday at the Union League Club in the Loop, Raoul identified immigration, reproductive health, the 2020 U.S. Census, the environment, emissions of ethylene oxide, and teen vaping as key issues — with all but the last topic finding him in opposition to President Trump.

Raoul said he was working “against corporations acting in ways inconsistent with the public interest,” as well as the U.S. Justice Department when it has “decided to take a step back” from civil rights or when the federal government “has decided to implement unlawful policies.”

Raoul specifically cited how “here in Illinois, the failure of the federal government to protect our environment has manifested itself in the regulation of ethylene-oxide emissions” — or, rather, the lack of regulation by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

The attorney general said he has used “affirmative litigation” to help combat EtO emissions, but he cautioned that additional legislation was needed in the General Assembly to provide a permanent solution. “Sterigenics has closed its doors in Willowbrook,” he said. “But our fight to ensure no community faces dangerous levels of EtO emissions is not over.”

He called out drug manufacturers, saying, “Pharmaceutical companies should be held accountable for the irresponsible marketing of opioids and their role in an epidemic of addiction that claims the lives of 130 Americans every day,” six of them on average Illinoisans.

“Pharmaceutical companies should be held accountable for the irresponsible marketing of opioids and their role in an epidemic of addiction that claims the lives of 130 Americans every day.”

Attorney General Kwame Raoul (One Illinois/Ted Cox)

Raoul pointed out he sometimes sided against other attorneys general, as in his joining a suit to defend the Affordable Care Act, or Obamacare, from a Texas attempt to undercut the program entirely.

But he saved his most impassioned remarks for the way the state is fighting lax federal regulations on gun control to combat the ongoing epidemic of gun violence. “It’s my duty to push back against this normalized violence,” Raoul said, adding that he had worked on a digital gun-tracing platform to “stop the gun trafficking into our neighborhoods.”

He said, again, he was deploying “affirmative litigation” in an attempt to force reforms, but he added that he was also working to expand the definition of what constitutes a shooting “victim” in order to grant more people access to resources offered under the Crime Victim Compensation Program.

Raoul also said he was combating “the scourge of vaping,” a topic on which he’s in rare agreement with the president. Citing the recent “serious illness and even deaths of e-cigarette users,” he said he was at work “stopping this public-health crisis in its tracks.” Raoul said he was trying to halt online sales of e-cigarettes and ban flavored vaping devices. Trump also has mentioned banning flavored vaping devices.

Pointing out that the vaping rate among high-school students was recently estimated at 28 percent by U.S. Rep. Raja Krishnamoorthi of Schaumburg in another City Club appearance, Raoul said that topped the national smoking rate for cigarettes among adults, estimated at 14 percent by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

“We must stop the intentional targeting of children for nicotine addiction,” Raoul said.

He was not as optimistic about the possibility of adopting annual gun registration in Illinois, along the lines of annual auto registration. Asked when the General Assembly might pass such a law, Raoul said, “I don’t think any time soon, to be honest.”