South Cook News

Illinois 6th Congressional candidate Rob Cruz is suggesting federal alternatives to help with soaring gas prices amid calls for the state’s gas tax to be suspended.

“On the gas tax, even though it's a state issue at that level, the Federal House of Representatives can take the lead and create legislation that we would want to get fair trade and create energy independence so that these things can decline,” Cruz told South Cook News. "As we saw in the prior administration and prior administrations, not just like our last president but prior ones before them as we created energy independence and had fair trade deals, our markets stabilized in the United States and created these lower income.”

Cruz expounded on the subject and discussed how the tax rate can affect other commodities.

“No one even talks about how the plastic that's used in this country comes from oil. And when I have a friend at work down in the Houston area, he extracts the plastic from the oil or we're getting it from somewhere else, the plastic cost more. Go look at a hardware store. Go look at Home Depot. Plastic prices have increased along with a lot of other things. Energy independence and fair trade is the remedy to those types of issues.”

Still holding the second-highest gas tax in the country, Illinois has held the spot since 2019, when Gov. J.B. Pritzker signed a bill that has caused the gas tax to increase twice. Last month, the governor proposed to pause the hike and has recently said his administration is "looking at ways we can reduce the gas tax across the state of Illinois, because we recognize, even since I introduced my budget, that war has broken out and the result of that war is that oil prices have gone through the roof.”

The people of Illinois have been paying 77.96 cents per gallon for taxes alone — federal and state taxes combined. In comparison to other states, Missouri pays the second-lowest gas tax. In Illinois, a gallon of gas costs 42 cents more than Missouri due to differing tax policies.

Illinois’ 6th Congressional District is perhaps the state’s most competitive. In the June 28 primary, incumbent Democrats Sean Casten and Marie Newman will face off against one another, and then a slew of Republican challengers including Cruz and Orland Park Mayor Keith Pekau. 

Cruz, an elected official, was booted off the Oak Lawn District 229 school board in January when his fellow board members vacated his seat. The procedure used to remove Cruz was created in the event that an elected person broke his or her official oath or was convicted of an "infamous crime.” Cruz was removed after challenging Pritzker’s controversial mask mandate in school that was later ruled unconstitutional by two courts.