Gov. Rod Blagojevich visited Christie Clinic in Champaign today to promote a bill to tax large corporations to provide healthcare for all Illinois residents.

Illinois currently has a regressive tax system, in which the most powerful corporations are not paying their fair share, Blagojevich said.

While the plan exempts 85 percent of businesses in the state, it targets big business. Blagojevich said nearly 10,000 corporations with gross sales of more than 260 billion dollars are paying no taxes. The fairest way of acquiring revenue to provide healthcare to all people in Illinois is to make big businesses pay their fair share, Blagojevich added.

Illinois’ cover program will not just provide healthcare to 1.4 million uninsured people, but will also offer men and women, between the ages of 20 and 30, going off to college or out into the workforce the option of remaining on their parents’ insurance policy until the age of 29.

“I believe everyone has a God-given right to get healthcare,” he said. “This is a moral imperative. This is literally a matter of life and death.”

The Governor plans to spend the week traveling Illinois to promote his new plan. He also spoke tonight in Danville at the Laura Lee Fellowship, 213 E. Williams St.

Read the Daily Illini tomorrow for more information about the visit.