Gov. Rod Blagojevich has thrown down the gauntlet. Speaking to reporters from the site of the Republic Windows sit-down strike, the governor said the state would suspend any business dealings with the Bank of America until it extended credit to the shuttered company. According to the Tribune, Illinois has “hundreds of millions of dollars” in dealings with the bank. Here’s the transcript from his statement, which you can view over at the Huffington Post:

We have contacted all of our agencies across state government and as of right now, every agency has been ordered to suspend doing any business with the Bank of America. The Bank of America received $25 billion in taxpayer money as part of the financial bailout. This is exactly, precisely the kind of thing that isn’t right -- when one the one hand, powerful special interests get the help of taxpayer money to bail them out -- the banks -- and yet the purpose of that money was supposed to be to provide a line of credit to businesses like this to keep workers working and keep people employed. And yet the Bank of America has yet to step up and say that they are going to be helpful to this company and keep these workers working. So unless and until they do that, we the state of Illinois will suspend doing any business with the Bank of America and we hope that this kind of leverage and pressure will encourage the Bank of America to do the right thing for this business, take some of that federal tax money that they received, and invest it by providing the necessary credit to this company so these workers can keep their jobs.

Check back later in the day for more updates.

UPDATE: According to the AP, state officials will also will ask for a federal court injunction tomorrow to ensure that the Republic Window employees receive the benefits they are owed under federal law.