Chicago Has Always Been the Frontrunner

The Arlington Heights bill cleared the House 78-32 and died in the Senate over one word: Chicago. Every plan since has added the city back in.

By Dear Kevin Warren · 2026-10-14

Gov. JB Pritzker, October 13, after the only governor's debate: the state could give the Bears "the option of being in the city of Chicago or being in Arlington Heights."

Talks, he said, are "closer now than we have been before."

Chicago didn't sneak back into this. It never left.

Warren's first pitch was the lakefront

April 24, 2024. Kevin Warren's first stadium plan as Bears president was a $4.7 billion dome on the lakefront, next to Soldier Field.

The Bears had owned 326 acres in Arlington Heights for 14 months by then. They paid $197.2 million for it in February 2023. Warren still started downtown.

Arlington Heights became the only site in Cook County that worked in a September 2025 letter. Indiana showed up in December, in a letter that said it was "not about leverage."

The Arlington-only bill had one problem

HB 910 passed the Illinois House 78-32 on April 22, 2026. Plenty of votes.

It died in the Senate. Sen. Bill Cunningham (D-Chicago) ran the Senate side of the talks. On May 30 he said the PILOT at the bill's core "does not have the support to pass," and he told the Sun-Times why:

> "From day one, there has always been a Chicago problem with the Bears proposal."

The bill asked Chicago lawmakers to vote for a tax break that helps a business leave Chicago. They declined.

Same day, Cunningham told Capitol News Illinois the Bears had met with the City of Chicago repeatedly "over the last several months." Publicly, the team said it had exhausted every opportunity to stay in Chicago.

Pritzker in June: "Apparently, there was some discussion with the city of Chicago, after they told everybody that they wanted to be in Arlington Heights. And you can imagine for Chicago legislators and for everybody considering the bills, confusing, which one do you want?"

Take Chicago off the board and the Arlington Heights deal is signed by June. The House already passed it. Nobody in the Senate was fighting over the price. They were fighting over the city, and the Bears kept the city on the phone the whole time.

The fix is more Chicago

Since the spring session died, every proposal has added Chicago back.

Rep. Kam Buckner (D-Chicago) floated a public stadium authority that he said could work if Chicago competes alongside Arlington Heights. Cunningham said the Senate's replacement, HB 958, would put the two on equal footing. The Tribune reported October 13 that the coming bill carries a Chicago option to make it "more palatable to Chicago lawmakers."

October 1: Pritzker sat down with NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell, Bears board member Pat Ryan, House Speaker Chris Welch, Cunningham, and Buckner. Buckner's district wraps around Soldier Field.

Kevin Warren's name wasn't on the Governor's Office list.

A bill without Chicago couldn't pass. The bill being written now has Chicago in it. That's what frontrunner means in Springfield.

Indiana is a bluff

Hammond has a law, a board vote to "advance," and a mayor who says the law has to be rewritten before it fits his own site.

It doesn't have a lease. It doesn't have financing. It doesn't have an NFL vote, and relocation takes 24 of 32 owners. The commissioner who runs that vote spent October 1 in a room with Chicago legislators.

Indiana state Rep. Earl Harris Jr. says he hopes for a decision by January. Hoping is what's left when nobody calls back.

Arlington Heights Mayor Jim Tinaglia, June: "There has been nothing that I have heard come from anybody's lips in the Bears organization that would make me believe that they want to go to Indiana."

Springfield's answer to Hammond was to add Chicago to the bill. That's how seriously anyone in the room takes Hammond.

The logistics are in Why It Won't Be Indiana.

November 17

The veto session opens November 17. Pritzker says something gets done, and not "at the expense of the taxpayers."

When the bill text drops, read the site list. Chicago won't be on it as a favor to the city. It'll be there because nothing passes without it.

The Bears have played in Chicago since 1921. Every plan to take them out of the city has had to go through Chicago first.