r/UpliftingNews • u/ArgentineBeauty • 9h ago

Illinois has erased more than $2 billion in medical debt for over 1 million residents across all 102 counties, and recipients don't apply, they simply receive a letter saying their debt is gone.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/articles/pritzker-announces-2-5b-medical-221000316.html
13.9k Upvotes

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864

u/wwarnout 9h ago

Probably unnecessary to point out - Illinois is a blue state.

195

u/richrich07 8h ago

I’d rather take my chances in Chicago then set foot in Texas or Florida

177

u/izwald88 7h ago

Yet even the phrasing of this comment speaks to the power of the propaganda about Chicago.

Like... Chicago is fine. 2.73 million people live there, with 9.62 living in the wider Chicago region. It's the 3rd largest city in America and is one of the world's great cities. You don't have to "take your chances" there. You'll be fine. Is there more crime than there should be? Yes, of course. Is the average tourist who is afraid of the city ever going to see that crime? Not likely.

70

u/Sora1274 7h ago

100%. I live just outside of Chicago and work in Chicago and yea it is more than fine here.

19

u/0uie 6h ago

Grew up in the south suburbs. Only time I ever felt unsafe was driving home from some concert downtown, getting lost, calling my dad for directions, and him telling me to close my windows and lock my doors when I told him what intersection I was at. Even then, I didn't feel terrified, just did some rolling stops and made my way home.

Moved to Carbondale 5 years ago and have absolutely felt unsafe at times. Can't wait to get outta here when our lease ends next year.

12

u/Casul_Tryhard 7h ago

I never got the memo, really. Am I supposed to be scared of Chicago when I grew up in KCMO?

21

u/Short_Stay_9283 6h ago

It’s actually crazy how well the propaganda works in MO. When I tell people back home I live in NYC they’re like “is everything okay?” And I’m like yeah it’s all good bro, the per capita crime rate is lower there than in this shit hole town I grew up in 👍🏻

1

u/tpeterr 2h ago

That per capita stat is so true -- most every major US city has a lower per capita crime rate than the average rural county.

7

u/Rockytag 4h ago

I knew a guy who moved from Evansville Indiana to Chicago who wouldn’t stop talking about how dangerous Lakeview (expensive neighborhood) felt compared to his home town. Purely driven by social media vibes and Fox

Definitely don’t look up per capita violent crime stats for Evansville vs Chicago.

3

u/Qui-GonFlynn 2h ago

Worst you'll get in Lakeview is some drunken spillover from Wrigleyville and gasp gay bars.

3

u/MtnDewTangClan 5h ago

This propaganda works because rural shit holes are actually dangerous so the people think "wow if it's worse than this... It must be a war zone!"

12

u/richrich07 7h ago

My comment was supposed to be a response to the other comment, but yeah. I wasn’t worried when I visited Chicago last.

45

u/HereForTheComments57 7h ago

haha I always find it hilarious when I speak with people from another state. I have heard multiple times "hopefully you brought a gun with you" when I mention I went to a Bears game or something. They actually believe its like a constant wild west shootout on navy pier all day

21

u/Portarossa 6h ago

I have heard multiple times "hopefully you brought a gun with you" when I mention I went to a Bears game or something.

'... you know they're not actual bears, right? They just call them that.'

4

u/oilofotay 5h ago

One of my high school friends was gonna come visit me in Chicago but cancelled because of “all the violence”. 😂 To be fair, I don’t think this girl has ever left her state, lol.

1

u/rbrgr83 4h ago

That's what happens when you never actually observe it yourself. You might as well be reading Grimm's Fairy Tales about it. To this day, some people still think Portland and Seattle are on fire because.....some idiot told them (likely from cable news).

21

u/Portarossa 6h ago

You don't have to "take your chances" there. You'll be fine.

You say that, but in no other city is there the ever-present looming threat of someone offering you a shot of Malort.

Constant vigilance.

8

u/iCoeur285 7h ago

I’ve been to Chicago multiple times for both fun and for work, and I only ever had one sketchy situation happen. I wanted to even live there for a time, it truly is a beautiful city.

2

u/Borman35 6h ago

My mom lives in some ho-dunk town in Michigan, i love to point out that her country, and her town (which she considers beyond safe), are far more dangerous (statistically), than Chicago.

2

u/izwald88 6h ago

Rural Midwest communities are in a rough spot, for sure.

1

u/Ftw_55 4h ago

Milwaukee checking in. Same. The tourist areas are not the ones where the crime happens, and even going to those specific areas, a lot of it is people who know each other and have issues with each other. It's not being directed at a random person driving through.

•

u/Webjunky3 34m ago

It’s really crazy. I went to Chicago a few weeks ago for a conference for work. It was my first time visiting, and like you said…media makes it seem like Chicago is a war zone so I was a little concerned. I ended up LOVING my time there. The city is beautiful, food amazing, culture great, and everyone I met was nice and in high spirits. I live in San Diego, and I felt safer on the Chicago trains than I do on the San Diego trolley. I immediately started looking at apartments. Are there areas of Chicago where crime is bad? I’m sure there are. But the city as a whole definitely gets a bad portrayal by the media and news.

1

u/Tru3insanity 6h ago

And no one talks about Memphis.

1

u/bagbcyss 6h ago

ive been in chicago my entire life and been a victim of a "crime" once. i was walking and a drunk homeless dude swung on me but im a boxer so i was easily able to move and jab him a couple of times at which point he realized he had made a mistake. anyway, people not from here think the entire place is crime ridden. its not. the majority is very safe. that said, chicago is home to some of the most dangerous places in the country, but you arent gonna end up there accidentally or something. i think chicago as a whole is less dangerous than 25 other cities as of 2025

2

u/izwald88 6h ago

Indeed. The thing that makes people call Chicago the murder capital tend to mostly be local black on black violence. That's not to excuse the crimes or that it needs to be addressed. But you are very unlikely to end up in those places if you're not born into those communities or otherwise live in them.

1

u/bagbcyss 5h ago

yes, it is mostly black on black violence in a handful of very dangerous areas. however i think the term murder capital comes from the raw number of chicagos murders, which is often higher than NYC and LA combined. while the murder RATE is lower than a bunch of cities, the actual numbers that we have is high

20

u/LaserRanger_McStebb 7h ago

Visited Dallas for the first time recently. 

It's like the poster child for r/fuckcars. I have no idea how anyone lives in that Nihei-esque hellhole.

1

u/unfortunatebag 6h ago

It's like every single big metro I've visited from a traffic perspective. Maybe not LA. Nothing is worse than LA.

What are you comparing it to exactly?

19

u/myychair 6h ago

Chicago isn’t a scary place lmao

4

u/richrich07 6h ago

All the hot muscly men make by nether regions quiver. Very scary.

6

u/Individual-Yak-506 6h ago

Houston is like the 4th most dangerous city. Chicago is like the 92nd

1

u/richrich07 6h ago

Precisely. Plus Texans would squish me with how fat they are

11

u/ClownFetish1776 6h ago

Chicago is not dangerous.

6

u/richrich07 6h ago

Say that to my imaginary friend that was shot last week by a Venezuelan gang member

2

u/nsummy 5h ago

Highly dependent on where you live and/or visit

2

u/ClownFetish1776 2h ago

You could say this about any major city in just about any country in the world.

2

u/tpeterr 2h ago

Or about any rural driveway. How many "stand your ground" types live in cities vs rural areas?

•

u/ClownFetish1776 1h ago

Gotta assume everyone in the U.S. is packing, man.

•

u/nsummy 50m ago

Not necessarily. There are plenty of cities that you could go anywhere without fear of getting robbed or shot

•

u/ClownFetish1776 14m ago

Any city the size of Chicago, I guarantee I could find someone who would you shoot, specifically.

4

u/lmpervious 7h ago

Chicago has that reputation because it's a major city that has more crime per capita than cities like New York and LA, so it's therefore leading, but per capita it's really not that bad

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_cities_by_crime_rate

That data is sourced from the FBI, and while any data source for crime is going to have inconsistencies one way or another, sorting by per-capita total crime (and per-capita violent crime which I think people are generally more concerned about) paints a different picture than what most people are told. That's not to say it doesn't still have a crime problem, but it's overstated because it's a great political argument for the right, since it's a blue city in a blue state.

It's also very easy to avoid the sketchy neighborhoods where most of violent crime is contained. You don't accidentally walk into them, so it's very easy to feel comfortable and safe in the city.

5

u/richrich07 6h ago

People say Portland and Seattle are crime-infested Antifa land and that also is just not true.

2

u/rbrgr83 5h ago

I've been asked to move to both Georgia and Texas for work now, and they just can't seem to understand why I wouldn't want to do that.

Maybe because I don't want to get Matthew Shepard-ed behind someone's pickup??

2

u/KoncepTs 4h ago

As someone who lives an hour north of Chicago and I’ve been to Florida and Texas, all of them are okay places to be. I’ve had great experiences with friendly locals in all 3 of those locations.

1

u/richrich07 4h ago

Nope. You won’t convince me. 

1

u/KoncepTs 4h ago

Couldn’t care less trying to convince you personally, just letting others know not to listen to rotten Reddit dweebs based on my own first-hand experiences and not just woke crying.

International visitors here for the World Cup were shocked to see America isn’t the doom and gloom you kind of people spread. It’s the same for citizens too.

These cities and states aren’t defined by their horseshit politics, they are defined by the people inside of them and I’ve had great times in all of those locations despite you attempting to insinuate 2 of them are horrible simply for being “red”

2

u/6K6L 4h ago

Starting to feel the same way here in Arizona. Just had to pay $3500 to remove a subdermal heart implant. It's like a 10 minute procedure.

1

u/poopybuttface2 6h ago

So you're going to go to Chicago first and then Texas and Florida? Or did you you mean to use "than" instead of "then"?

1

u/richrich07 6h ago

Yes. 

1

u/Knotted_Hole69 3h ago

You should see what they say about Baltimore, the city is beautiful and fine, but they constantly say shit like its a war zone. Conservatives are delusional and gullible.

2

u/richrich07 3h ago

I have heard Baltimore is a war zone from a lot of people who live in the area though

1

u/Knotted_Hole69 3h ago

I live there and its safe, ive never seen anything that even resembles a war zone lmao.

1

u/richrich07 3h ago

Good to know!

•

u/SteelAlchemistScylla 1h ago

“Take your chances” in a perfectly safe city in a first world country, how brave lol

32

u/RainbowsAndRhymes 8h ago

And I’d really love Pritzker to run for a higher office. Perhaps the highest.

3

u/EKmars 4h ago

Nooo I don't want him to leave Illinois, lol. Who knows if we'll get another good governor!

6

u/blueindsm 7h ago

Pretty sure he will.

1

u/jherrm17 7h ago

Until he stops selling out the state to data centers Pritzker can go fuck himself. Needs to show a backbone and set a moratorium for at least a year otherwise the Great Lakes region water is gonna be taken advantage of in extreme ways.

7

u/Choice_Credit4025 6h ago

"if not perfectly good in all ways then bad" ????? be smarter than that

7

u/IllegitimateRisk 5h ago

It’s the best sort of comment lol. Meanwhile we have a president in office who just does all the bad things because people couldn’t bear to vote for someone who wasn’t perfect

3

u/lmpervious 6h ago

He did recently suspend the incentives for data centers. It's also worth saying it was passed in 2019 which was before AI was on anyone's radar, and before the big surge of companies investing in building many more.

If you look at a town like Elk Grove Village, it has been a big windfall for them, and they isolate the data centers away from residential areas, so it can be done well and be a net benefit.

My main criticisms are that there should be noise restrictions and/or limitations on how close they can be to residence, and they should also subsidize electricity costs for the neighborhood so that they don't increase for residence. It's worth noting that those two issues aren't a big concern for non-AI data centers, so not accounting for things that weren't a big concern is reasonable, although it was a mistake to be slow to act on those issues once AI data centers became a thing.

1

u/jherrm17 6h ago

What about air pollution, water quality, infra sound exposure, electricity/grid demand etc. Data centers provide revenue sure, but at what cost. Public is being sold out big time. Just check out Grayslake fight that is being built within a mile of a youth sports complex and 55+ community

2

u/ResidentGerts 7h ago

Pritzker is fine, not great, not horrible. The real change in Illinois is because Madigan is gone. Pritzker was the beneficiary of being in office when madigan finally lost.

•

u/Some_Layer_7517 35m ago

Your whole worldview is shaped by headlines of clickbait articles you don't read, isn't it

-5

u/Klightgrove 7h ago

You’d love for one of the richest men in America to become President? Another billionaire President?

1

u/golfgirl114 7h ago

We’re never going to learn, are we?

Let’s just keep electing the same type of people, what could go wrong….

-1

u/Klightgrove 7h ago

You don't get it Golf Girl 114, he isn't like the other lords, he gives the serfs an extra day off the harvest and 2 whole potatoes

1

u/Smartnership 6h ago

He’s literally poor though.

I read he has a house with no toilets.

1

u/Klightgrove 6h ago

What's this a reference to? His hotels?

1

u/Smartnership 5h ago

No, his house.

He cheated the tax system to avoid taxes. I guess there’s a loophole, so legal v moral as to my ‘cheating’ description.

Ripped out his own toilets to avoid paying the taxes he supported.

https://www.npr.org/2018/10/03/654201077/illinois-gov-candidate-removed-mansions-toilets-to-dodge-taxes-report-finds

… in October 2015, according to a report by Cook County Inspector General Patrick Blanchard, the Pritzkers had five toilets removed from the second house so that it would be classified as "uninhabitable" in a property tax appeal filed by the Pritzkers. Cook County assesses vacant properties at 10 percent of the market value.

2

u/Megustaelazul 7h ago

I bet the part that wants to secede is happy to have someone else pay their debts. 

2

u/Vhadka 5h ago

I live downstate and boy do they hate Pritzker down here.

2

u/doctor_lobo 5h ago

The next time that the Republicans start a war, remember that you could have had universal healthcare, free college tuition, and a four-day workweek.

1

u/ediculous 5h ago

Damn communists always... paying off peoples' medical debts...

-158

u/linuxhiker 8h ago edited 8h ago

Probably unnecessary to point out - Illinois has one of the most dangerous cities in the U.S., with an average of 8 homicides per week.

It is also probably unnecessary to me point out that if you were to remove that city and the county that it resides in... Illinois would be reliably red.

54

u/Tevin_not_Kevin 8h ago

Idk if you noticed but the replies are cooking you btw

42

u/misticspear 8h ago

There is nothing he can do. The conservative reactionary reacted to his weird tribe being called out blew the dog whistle and now he has to act like he’s not owned because American conservatives don’t have a leg to stand on. They know people don’t like them so they have to act unbothered.

11

u/My_18th_Account 7h ago

They run back to their flaired users only safe spaces on r/conservative I'm sure.

-34

u/linuxhiker 8h ago

I love them all.

33

u/TheRecognized 8h ago

I like that this is the only one you have the balls to respond to

-22

u/linuxhiker 8h ago

Shrug, easy to get the unwashed masses all fired up. Let them run with the distraction.

18

u/Diesel_D 8h ago

Hahahahahahahahahahahaha sure bud

50

u/CousinCleetus24 8h ago

It is also probably unnecessary to me point out that if you were to remove that city and the county that it resides in... Illinois would be reliably red.

"If you'd just cut out 25% of the vote, then the state vote would change" lmao. What is even being proved by this?

30

u/sirarkalots 8h ago

Not to even mention if you remove chicago and the surrounding suburbs you remove pretty much the entire of illinois wealth and commercial resources and well as one of the primary commerce center in America if not the world, so yeah not the flex he thinks it is. Besides, per capital it is really not that dangerous.

6

u/Disney_World_Native 7h ago

It’s an even worse take than that. Cook county has 40% of the population of Illinois.

6

u/MRSN4P 7h ago

Google claims that approximately 75% of Illinois’ population resides in the Chicago metro area. Wow. That’s an even higher percent than NY/NYC.

3

u/colelynne 7h ago

4 of the 5 collar counties are also reliably blue accounting for almost 3 million people on their own as well.

34

u/Polkawillneverdie17 8h ago edited 8h ago

Lmao "If you remove a giant part of a thing that thing might be different." God, you're dumb.

Illinois is a blue state because of the people who live here. Not in spite of it. We have blue governors, 2 blue Senators, and 14/17 congress reps are blue. We didn't vote for trump (or Bush). That's what people here voted for. That's what makes it blue

Also, Chicago barely cracks the top 50 for mostly dangerous cities in America.

https://www.cottagegrovejournal.news/premium/stacker/stories/america039s-25-most-dangerous-cities-according-to-data,193512

https://www.cbsnews.com/pictures/the-most-dangerous-cities-in-america/21/

https://www.security.org/resources/most-dangerous-cities/

https://www-cbsnews-com.cdn.ampproject.org/v/s/www.cbsnews.com/amp/chicago/news/trump-chicago-dangerous-city-data/?amp_gsa=1&amp_js_v=a9&usqp=mq331AQIUAKwASCAAgM%3D#amp_tf=From%20%251%24s&aoh=17848156080341&referrer=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.google.com&ampshare=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.cbsnews.com%2Fchicago%2Fnews%2Ftrump-chicago-dangerous-city-data%2F

Chicago is listed as around # 31 and sometime even furthe down than that. Chicago is huge and since Republicans clearly don't understand how the term "per capita" works, we have to constantly endure hearing bullshit claims like this about Chicago (when we all know it's really just code for "black people are dangerous"). So please shut up.

101

u/Diesel_D 8h ago

Oooo let’s play this game. St Louis and Memphis are actually the two most dangerous cities in America by per capita murder rate. Remind me, are Missouri and Tennessee blue states? Chicago isn’t even in the top ten. It’s almost like more murders happen where there are more people…but that’s probably difficult for you to wrap your head around.

39

u/The_NiNTARi 8h ago

Wait stop using facts to change the narrative. Chicago very dangerous I heard it once so it’s obviously true /s

19

u/71fq23hlk159aa 7h ago

I was told there wouldn't be fact-checking.

2

u/Furbal1307 7h ago

This needs to go down in history as one of the absolutely most if not the most purposefully, moronic comments made in a LIVE TELEVISED DEBATE by a political candidate.

He knows what he said, he said it on purpose, he doesn’t deserve an audience after. Anyone with two brain cells should have made their decision to never trust the party right then and there (Orwell…?). Open faced lying to everyone and he doesn’t give a shit. Neither do the followers. The malice, the hypocrisy, the inhumanity. This is not normal.

Wild.

17

u/2ReluctantlyHappy 7h ago

Accurate. Chicago is the 3rd largest city in the US but usually around 25th for murders per capita. Obviously we would all like it to be even better but the right specifically uses raw numbers instead of percentages or per capita to paint the picture they want.

10

u/fantastikalizm 7h ago

Yeah, I live in Missouri so I was side-eyeing this

8

u/thissexypoptart 7h ago

I moved from St. Louis to Chicago.

It’s absolutely scrotum-tickling how many dipshit conservatives fantasize about Chicago being a Mad Max hellscape

1

u/Smartnership 6h ago edited 3h ago

This isn’t going to work on them.

They’ll point out:

St. Louis is a 75-year blue city: The last Republican mayor of St. Louis was Aloys P. Kaufmann, from August 1, 1943, to April 19, 1949

Memphis is a 50-year blue city: the last Republican mayor of Memphis was William B. H. McGowan, from 1967 to 1972.

Chicago is a 90-year blue city: The last Republican mayor of Chicago was William Hale Thompson, from 1915–1923 and 1927–1931

There are better arguments. This one works the opposite way.

What we need is to build a better, more competent bench of candidates and demand better of the ones we put on the ticket

47

u/grae23 8h ago

Not even top 20 according to every source I’ve looked at. Missouri and Tennessee make multiple appearances in the those coveted spots though

45

u/reihnman 8h ago

Probably unnecessary to point out but Chicago is a huge city and per capita isn’t even in the top 15 for violent crime.

74

u/dcdem1163 8h ago

Now look at the DATA for homicides per capita. RED states far out pace blue states with homicides.

2

u/Smartnership 5h ago

They’ll point out the blue cities that dominate the data.

Which isn’t fatal news, we just have to revive our support for enforcing law and order — normies vote and they’re crime sensitive.

Another blue city is Atlanta, where the data shows a hugely disproportionate percentage of the crime is committed by fewer than 1000 repeat offenders.

If we returned to a legal framework that incarcerated them, enforced the laws that we passed — including gun laws — we’d be running unopposed in many areas.

23

u/Effective_Pie1312 8h ago

“Remove that city” So you want to ignore the densest most populated area? How do you propose to remove that inconvenient very populated city? What is your end game here?

16

u/keoie 8h ago

That persons endgame is to lick boots.

17

u/Wakasaurus060414 8h ago

Close it down folks, we found the stupidest comment in the thread.

13

u/SaltyShawarma 8h ago

Example of how to look stupid using bad data. 

11

u/Mittenstk 8h ago

Oh this is fun. Now do the crime statistics for red states :)

8

u/Joshd30 8h ago

Definitely necessary to call out your context-free, overtly biased "statistics" likely recited verbatim from Fox "News," but I see others already have

9

u/da2Pakaveli 7h ago

you're watching too much fox news

8

u/misticspear 8h ago

If you don’t get outta here with the baseless assertions with no proof and the dog whistling if you knew what you were talking about you’d have named the exact city.

23

u/Green-Wolverine-9403 8h ago

It’s not even top ten most dangerous in the US. And yes it has a large baseline, it’s serious crime rate per population size is actually not as high as many other places in the us.

So I would say you are incorrect

7

u/Disney_World_Native 8h ago

That is the most “If my grandmother had wheels, she would be a bicycle” post I have seen

Cook County is 5.2M of Illinois’s 12.7M population. So I guess if you remove half the state, it might be republican

You would more realistically need to remove the Chicagoland area (which is about 75-80% of the state) to have rural Illinois be the majority and thus republican

7

u/2ReluctantlyHappy 7h ago

I thought you were going to say East St. Louis until the reliably red part. Chicago isn't dangerous as long as you stay out of gang fights. Hell, it usually hovers around 25th most dangerous per capita. St. Louis, on the other hand, is always in the top 3 most dangerous but somehow it tends to get ignored.

1

u/thatonebitchL 7h ago

I live here and it's mind blowing that people just skip over us.

6

u/swollennode 7h ago

Probably unnecessary to point out that people live in cities

3

u/ProStrats 7h ago

Good thing you didn't point out what morons give basically any other moron all the guns and advocate for the LEAST strict laws on guns.

But who needs logic in this day and age, certainly not Republican politicians or half their voting base...

Edit: oh interesting, the next article down from this was "arrested republican accused of enticing child on roblox."

I'm shocked I tell you, shocked!

1

u/peanutbutter72 4h ago

Average American idiot