CLAIM: Illinois’ Democrat Gov. J.B. Pritzker has claimed that his bail reform law would stop a “mother” who was “arrested for stealing diapers” from spending six months in jail because she “can’t afford bail.”
VERDICT: FALSE
The threshold for arrest in the state of Illinois for retail theft is $300 and up. Diapers cost less than $50 for a box of 80-some diapers. While Pritzker has not mentioned how many diapers the “mother” stole before being arrested, it seems unlikely a mom would be stealing hundreds of dollars worth of diapers.
The story is even less believable in Cook County where George Soros-funded State’s Attorney Kim Foxx has raised the retail theft arrest threshold to $1,000 worth of merchandise.
Further, with the dollar amount of retail theft so much higher than the cost of diapers, it is unlikely that such a “mother” would be arrested and thrown in jail for stealing diapers unless she had other outstanding warrants.
Perhaps realizing his claim seems sketchy, in his latest telling of the tale, the billionaire governor has added theft of baby formula to his “mother’s” haul.
In defense of his bail reform law, the SAFE-T Act, which he championed and signed into law, Pritzker pulled out his “arrested mother” story first on Sept. 14.
The way he told the story was odd. It is almost as if he was citing an actual case, though he did not say that exactly.
According to Fox 32, Pritzker said his bail elimination law is aimed at helping the poor escape unfair stints in jail.
“Making sure that we’re also addressing the problem of a single mother who shoplifted diapers for her baby, who is put in jail and kept there for six months because she doesn’t have a couple of hundred dollars to pay for bail,” Pritzker said at a press conference. “So that’s what the Safe-T Act is about. Are there changes, adjustments that need to be? Of course, and there have been adjustments made and there will continue to be. Laws are not immutable.”
The way the Democrat incumbent phrased the story made it seem as if he was relating a real case.
Pritzker went on to deliver the claim a second time. During last Friday’s Illinois gubernatorial debate, Pritzker blasted Republican opponent Darren Bailey for opposing the bail reform law that takes effect in January of next year. His second use of the story was less exacting and seemed more like an example.
“Darren Bailey wants to keep the current system where murderers and rapists and domestic abusers can buy their way out of jail. Meanwhile, a new mother who needs diapers or baby formula and commits shoplifting in order to obtain those things is in danger of sitting in jail for months because she can’t afford a few dollars in bail,” Pritzker said during the debate, according to the Chicago Tribune.
Regardless, in no case has the Illinois media confronted Pritzker on the unlikely example of a mother being jailed for “six months” for small-time shoplifting.
Indeed, as Illinois writer John Ruberry noted, a member of the media sat idly by and said nothing in a one-on-one interview where Pritzker used his increasingly favorite “mother” example.
In an interview with NPR reporter Brian Mackey published on Oct. 3, Pritzker said, “Today, without the Pretrial Fairness Act — under the current law, before that goes into effect — they can buy their way out. Murderers can buy their way out. But a young mother who can’t afford diapers and formula, and shoplifts those, goes into jail and can’t afford a couple of hundred dollars in bail. She sits and languishes in jail while a murderer can buy their way out. That’s not fair.”
Regardless, his claim that a mother could be arrested for stealing diapers and formula would end up in jail for six months seems incredibly unlikely and does not comport to the actual laws on the books.
Follow Warner Todd Huston on Facebook at: facebook.com/Warner.Todd.Huston, or Truth Social @WarnerToddHuston
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