Faced with continued questions about legal challenges to his executive powers, Gov. JB Pritzker sought to remind everyone Wednesday that he took emergency action because of the human toll the COVID-19 outbreak is taking on Illinois.

“There clearly is an emergency folks. Let’s pay attention. People are dying every day,” Pritzker said. “In Illinois, we continue to have people die every day.”

Illinois Department of Public Health Director Dr. Ngozi Ezike reported an additional 92 deaths from COVID-19 in the past 24 hours, raising the total fatalities to 2,215 since the outbreak began earlier this year.

There were another 2,253 new cases also confirmed in the past 24 hours.

Meanwhile, lab results continue to come in a new levels. Nearly 15,000 test results were reported to the state in the past 24 hours. Public health officials have long said expanded testing is key to getting ahead of the disease and also eventually re-opening the economy.

As of midnight Tuesday, there were more than 5,000 Illinoisans hospitalized with COVID-19. Of them, 1,290 were in Intensive Care Units and of them, 777 were on ventilators.

The governor announced the state secured a contract with a commercial lab to run 3,000 tests a day from long-term care facilities at no cost to the facilities. This is part of a statewide push to address growing infection rates at nursing homes and similar long-term care facilities.

The governor was asked why mom-and-pop stores can’t be open if big box stores are.

Pritzker said the issue has been the essential business list has focused on grocery stores, and many big-box retailers also function as grocery stores. He said recent modifications to the order taking effect May 1 were done to try to find ways for more retailers to sell products.

The governor was asked when the General Assembly will be in session.

He reminded reporters that the Legislature is considered an essential service and it’s up to the legislative leaders.

“We need to make sure that all the people who work at the Capitol as well as the legislators are safe,” he said.

Pritzker also said he would consider a “GI Bill” for frontline workers for college tuition, like Michigan reportedly plans to offer. Has said he would like to find some kind of “combat pay” benefit for those who have been at the forefront of this.

The governor was asked about his wife and whether she had traveled to Florida.

“In politics, it used to be that we kept our families out of it,” Pritzker said. He declined to answer calling it “reprehensible.”

On the issue of downstate interests, the governor said he is in regular communication with downstate lawmakers and officials, welcomed letters from Central Illinois mayors about how to restart the economy and is targeting resources to address problem areas such as East St. Louis, which is just across the river from a national hotspot, and people obviously can commute back and forth.

The governor was also asked about a gun issue circulating on social media. The claim is that the concealed carry law makes it a crime to wear a mask and carry a gun. Now the governor is ordering people to wear a mask. Isn’t that making felons out of anyone otherwise legally carrying a concealed weapon?

Pritzker said state police are setting guidelines so that it would not be a crime to wear a COVID-19 mask and have a concealed weapon.