Rauner wants Illinois Supreme Court to put term limits ballot

Republican Bruce Rauner announced Thursday he would file an emergency petition with the Illinois Supreme Court, urging them to allow a November ballot initiative that would impose term limits on legislators.

On Wednesday, Rauner had tried and failed to get an appeals court to rule in his favor. The three-member 1st District Appellate Court had decided Rauner’s proposed constitutional amendment that the amendment failed to pass constitutional muster. A lower court had also ruled it unconstitutional.

But Rauner isn’t giving up.

“We think it’s critically important that the voters have a voice in deciding about term limits,” he said during a rare press conference in Chicago.

With a Friday deadline looming for the initiative to be certified for the ballot, Rauner called for quick action by the state Supreme Court to overturn the two lower court rulings.

A spokesman for the Supreme Court confirmed that the court had received the petition on Thursday.

About 600,000 Illlinois residents had signed petitions to put the term-limit question on the ballot.

Rauner also called incumbent Gov. Pat Quinn a “phony” on being a proponent of term limits, considering he had already been the governor for six years (actually, since 2009) and was running again.

Speaking elsewhere in downtown Chicago on Thursday, Quinn disagreed.

“In 1994, I led the effort to get term limits on the ballot, pure term limits. The Supreme Court said it couldn’t go on the ballot back in 1994 — 20 years ago,” Quinn said.

“He’s the phony.”

Contributing: Monifa Thomas, Natasha Korecki