ATTORNEY GENERAL RAOUL HIGHLIGHTS NEW LAWS

ATTORNEY GENERAL RAOUL HIGHLIGHTS NEW LAWS

December 26, 2024

Chicago - Attorney General Kwame Raoul today highlighted four new laws initiated by his office that will go into effect Jan. 1.

"My office has continued to work with the General Assembly to develop legislation to protect children, increase access to state services and advocate for the rights of workers and marginalized communities," Raoul said. "I look forward to our continued collaboration with law enforcement, legislators and various stakeholders to enact policies that protect residents and communities around Illinois."

House Bill 4623 builds on the work being done by Attorney General Raoul's office to crack down on child sexual abuse images throughout Illinois by prohibiting the use of Artificial Intelligence (AI) technology to create child sexual abuse images that either involve real children or obscene imagery.

Raoul introduced the legislation, which was sponsored in the General Assembly by Sen. Mary Edly-Allen and Rep. Jennifer Gong-Gershowitz. Experts from the Attorney General's office testified before legislative committees to explain technological advances that have enabled the creation of realistic, computer-generated images and videos of children, and to highlight the ways in which AI-generated child sexual abuse images are harmful. When AI technology uses images of real children to generate child sexual abuse images, the children who are depicted experience real reputational, emotional and privacy injuries. However, even when the technology does not use images of real children, the resulting child sexual abuse images nonetheless perpetuate abusive and predatory behavior.

Raoul's office, with a grant from the U.S. Department of Justice, runs the Illinois Internet Crimes Against Children (ICAC) Task Force that investigates child exploitation crimes and trains law enforcement agencies.

House Bill 5371, sponsored by Sen. Laura Fine and Rep. Ann Williams, will enhance civil rights protections for people in Illinois and provide important clarifications to the Illinois Human Rights Act (IHRA). The new law, which is the result of collaborative efforts by the Attorney General's office and the Illinois Department of Human Rights (IDHR), specifically will:

• Strengthen relief in discriminatory pattern-and-practice determinations by clarifying the term "per violation." For example, a business that repeatedly discriminates against multiple employees could be held accountable for each instance of a violation.
• The law also increases the maximum penalty amounts that a court may award in the Attorney General's pattern-and-practice determinations and fair housing lawsuits.
• Clarify that aggrieved parties have the right to take action to collect judgments, even if they do not intervene in the state's enforcement action.
• Codify criteria language from the Illinois Civil Rights Act of 2003 to expressly prohibit unjustified disparate impacts in real estate transactions.

The IHRA grants the Attorney General the authority to investigate broad, systemic problems or incidents of discrimination, referred to as "patterns or practices," and file suits to remedy such violations.

House Bill 5561 will protect workers from retaliatory conduct by employers, strengthen current protections under state law and codify the authority of Raoul's Workplace Rights Bureau to investigate and hold employers who retaliate or threaten to retaliate accountable.

Sponsored by Sen. Cristina Castro and Rep. Marcus Evans, this new law will broaden the scope of conduct protected under the Illinois Whistleblower Act to protect employees who report violations of the law or threats to public health and safety directly to their employer.

The definition of retaliation is also expanded under this law, now including blacklisting an employee from future opportunities and immigration-based retaliation. Finally, the law gives statutory authority to the Attorney General's office to bring suit against employers who retaliate or threaten retaliation against employees.

Senate Bill 3713, sponsored by Sen. Robert Peters and Rep. Maurice West, II, will increase accessibility to the Illinois Crime Victims Compensation Program, a program administered by the Attorney General's office that provides reimbursement to eligible victims of violent crime and their families, helping to pay expenses that include hospital and medical charges, funeral and burial costs, relocation expenses and lost wages related to the crime.

The law expands the number of individuals who would be eligible and reduces barriers for victims of violent crime and their families and is the result of the cooperative efforts of the Attorney General's office, Ascend Justice, and the Alliance for Safety and Justice, a longtime collaborator with the Attorney General's office.