Dave McKinney
Illinois Government and Politics Reporter | WBEZDave McKinney, state politics reporter at WBEZ, spent 19 years as the Chicago Sun-Times Springfield bureau chief with additional stops at Reuters and the Daily Herald. His work also has been published in Crain’s Chicago Business, the New York Times and Chicago Magazine.
McKinney, named by the Washington Post in 2014 as one of the country’s best statehouse reporters, has won the Society of American Business Editors and Writers Best-in-Business award, the Chicago Headline Club’s Lisagor Award for political and government reporting, the Chicago Bar Association’s Herman Kogan Award for Meritorious Achievement and the Chicago Journalists Association’s Sarah Brown Boyden Award. McKinney also was named Journalist of the Year by his alma mater, Eastern Illinois University, inducted into the university’s journalism hall of fame and was recipient of the Illinois Campaign for Political Reform’s Dawn Clark Netsch “Straight Talk Award” in 2015.
In Springfield, McKinney captured Rod Blagojevich’s final words as governor on the day of his 2009 impeachment by asking if he felt obliged to apologize to Illinoisans. “Sorry for what?” Blagojevich answered in a phrase that became the next day’s front-page headline. McKinney also covered corruption under Blagojevich and George Ryan, came face to face with Fidel Castro during Ryan’s 1999 trip to Cuba and live-tweeted an exorcism by Springfield’s Roman Catholic bishop after Illinois legalized gay marriage in 2013.
A lifelong Illinoisan with family roots downstate, McKinney is married, the proud father of two children and owner of a golden retriever and Wheaten terrier.
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The 80-year-old Democrat and East St. Louis native told WBEZ in an Illinois exclusive that age was a factor in his not seeking a sixth term in Congress. -
A right-leaning online publication had posted the birth dates and home addresses of hundreds of thousands of Illinois registered voters. -
If the projections hold true, Democratic Gov. JB Pritzker could face difficult financial decisions, from increasing taxes to cutting spending. -
While Pritzker has emphatically expressed his support of Biden, he’s also not quashed the narrative that he has White House ambitions. -
The standard exemption increase will mean an extra $69 or so for families of four. The tax credit will once again be tied to inflation after lawmakers last year quietly untied it. -
Illinois Gov. J,B. Pritzker’s office estimates the drugs — which include Wegovy, Mounjaro and Ozempic — will cost taxpayers $210 million the first year. But others put that number much higher. -
Tuesday’s results offered only bragging rights to the candidates after decisive primaries last week in Georgia, Mississippi and Washington state made both Biden and Trump the presumptive presidential nominees for their respective parties. -
The Cook County judge denied Trump’s request to stay the challenge until after the U.S. Supreme Court weighs in on similar challenges in other states, setting a Feb. 16 next court date. -
The more than 11 million Illinoisans who claim the standard exemption each year will not see an inflation-indexed bump for the 2023 tax year. -
The pledge, a vestige of the McCarthy Red Scare era, is not mandatory for candidates in Illinois. Despite that, it has been signed by candidates for decades — including Trump in 2016 and 2020. -
Michael Madigan, the longtime Illinois House Speaker, is charged with felony bribery and conspiracy. A Republican lawmaker from central Illinois wants to ban his portrait from the House. -
A WBEZ analysis shows that while people may be more cynical and government is more expensive, voter interest in state elections has only increased.