Gov. JB Pritzker will give his Illinois budget address on Wednesday, and there s already a major budget battle between the two parties brewing. Two months ago I asked Republicans in the General Assembly for their proposals to close this year s budget deficit. I was met with silence. Apparently their idea of bipartisanship ends when hard choices must be made, Pritzker said. The general funds budget I present today for Fiscal Year 2022 spends $1.8 billion less than FY2021. It reflects $400 million in additional cuts to appropriations, a hiring freeze, flat operational spending, full required pension payments, and the closure of unaffordable corporate loopholes, the governor added.