Chicago activists urge Pritzker to pass law to make polluters pay for climate change damages
'Illinois can and must do the same,' said Oscar Sanchez, co-executive director of the Southeast Environmental Task Force, at a Sunday rally.
'Kids get asthma before they learn to ride a bike. Cancer becomes a ZIP code issue. Our elders breathe toxic poison in their own home,' he said. 'It's not just the pollution, it's the climate crisis bearing down on us right now. We see streets turn into rivers after storms, basements flood, families lose everything. Meanwhile, oil and gas companies — the same ones fueling this crisis — are posting record-breaking profits.'
The group, a coalition led by the local Sunrise Movement chapter, gathered across the University of Chicago's David Rubenstein event venue in Woodlawn, where the Aspen Ideas Climate Conference officially kicked off Sunday afternoon with hundreds of leaders from business, government, academia and other fields.
Pritzker was set to discuss green tech and infrastructure investments; also invited were Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer and Alaska Gov. Mike Dunleavy, who were expected to talk about their approaches to energy and economic development.
Some of the young activists praised Pritzker for his commitment to climate issues and said he has an opportunity to demonstrate that by standing with Illinoisans and holding corporate polluters accountable. Passing a 'Make Polluters Pay' law, they say, would make these companies responsible for the public health and climate change impacts in Illinois that are a direct result of their activities.
In Chicago, for instance, such legislation would help address what activists have long protested as discriminatory zoning practices, which have pushed heavy industry into poor communities of color — exposing residents to toxic chemicals and pollutants and leading to a higher prevalence of negative health effects in the population, including cardiovascular and respiratory disease.
'We know what environmental racism looks like, because we live it every single day,' Sanchez said.
Some primarily Black and Hispanic neighborhoods and suburbs, like Chatham, Austin, Cicero and Berwyn, also experience severe flooding during heavy rains.
'If I'm going to be honest with everyone, I don't like being here. Because this shouldn't have to be our reality — that polluters are polluting Black, Latino, working-class communities across Chicago and Illinois,' said Gianna Guiffra, a Sunrise Movement volunteer. 'We shouldn't have to be protesting simply to tell them that we are human beings too. These big oil and gas companies make it very clear to everyone that they are choosing profit over life, that they are choosing profit over human beings, that they are choosing profit over our planet.'
In 2024, Vermont became the first state to require oil companies to pay for damages from extreme weather driven by climate change, after catastrophic flooding that summer. Later last year, New York also passed its own Climate Change Superfund Act, which would raise $75 billion over 25 years from the fossil fuel industry to fund climate change adaptation and mitigation projects in the state.
'These polluters should pay for the damage they have done to our communities,' Guiffra said.
Following suit, the activists say, means Pritzker would be standing up to the Trump administration, which has made 250 million acres of federal public land eligible for sale to the highest bidder, led regulatory rollbacks on polluters, and cut tax incentive programs for renewable energy projects.
'This could be the ground zero of a mass movement that puts the billionaires in check, takes power back for the people and guarantees hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of good, clean energy jobs,' said Sage Hanson, a Sunrise Movement volunteer.
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