SPRINGFIELD — Amid growing national fears about politically motivated violence and threats, Illinois lawmakers moved swiftly last fall to pass a sweeping statute allowing public officials to shield their personal information from public view.
But the new law — signed last month by Gov. JB Pritzker — also erects a barrier between citizens and records long considered essential to democratic accountability, including marital status and basic information about whether lawmakers, county clerks and other officials actually live in the districts and communities they serve.
Passed by the Senate in the waning hours of the Illinois General Assembly’s fall session — as lawmakers pushed through higher-profile measures such as a Chicago-area transit overhaul — the measure has begun raising free-speech and public accountability concerns. While the law’s stated purpose was to protect public officials from real-world threats, critics argue its reach is overly broad and extends well beyond safeguarding elected officials and their families from potential harm.
Transparency and press advocates say the statute threatens democratic oversight by creating a new legal mechanism that can shield information from public view, limit voters’ ability to scrutinize those in power and weaken the public’s right to know.
“This is basically a sledgehammer that will allow lawmakers to censor information about them from the internet, even information that poses no legitimate security concern and actually really matters for the public to know,” said Caitlin Vogus, senior adviser with the Freedom of the Press Foundation.
Under the law, government agencies, businesses and private individuals must redact and refrain from sharing the personal information of many current and former public officials upon request, though notably not those seeking office. Home addresses, phone numbers, personal email addresses and even marital status can all be removed from public view at the official’s discretion. The statute makes no explicit exception for journalism or political speech and applies retroactively, allowing officials to demand the removal of previously published material.
Questions as basic as whether an elected official meets residency requirements — a cornerstone of representative government — could become legally fraught to investigate or publish.
Society of Professional Journalists Executive Director Caroline Hendrie said she understands lawmakers’ safety concerns, but that they shouldn’t override the need for government transparency.
“This statute goes way too far in chilling the kind of public interest reporting that needs to happen so that public officials can be held accountable,” Hendrie said. “They need to understand that they are accountable to the public.”
Democratic Rep. Katie Stuart of Edwardsville, the chief House sponsor of the law, said the legislation was modeled after a 2012 measure that allows judges to request the shielding of their personal information. That law was enacted after the 2005 killings of the husband and mother of U.S. District Judge Joan Lefkow by a disgruntled litigant.
Stuart said the measure reflects a sobering escalation in political hostility and violence.
“Our spouses, our children, our loved ones deserve to be protected and not be put at risk,” Stuart said. “And really, nobody needs their life at risk to do the job of serving the public.”
She said she has received multiple threats and canceled public events due to safety concerns — an experience she said isn’t uncommon.
Recent incidents have underscored those fears. A right-wing provocateur posted a video from outside Pritzker’s home in Chicago’s Gold Coast neighborhood in September and urged followers to “take action” shortly after the assassination of conservative activist Charlie Kirk.
Last year, a suburban Chicago man was accused of threatening state Rep. Nicole La Ha and her family after allegedly contacting the Republican lawmaker through her website.
And last week, a city of Chicago employee was sentenced to two years’ probation after pleading guilty in connection with threats made against Republican state Sen. Andrew Chesney of Freeport.
The threats and violence extend beyond Illinois’ borders. In April, a man set fire to the governor’s mansion in Pennsylvania, threatening the life of the state’s Democratic governor, Josh Shapiro, and his family. In June, a gunman went to the homes of two Democratic Minnesota lawmakers, killing former House Speaker Melissa Hortman and her husband and wounding state Rep. John Hoffman and his wife.
More than 40% of state legislators experienced threats or attacks between 2021 and 2023, according to a Brennan Center for Justice report.
A spokesperson with Pritzker’s office didn’t address the transparency issues critics have raised about the bill and instead said that with the rise of political violence and threats, public officials deserve to have their safety taken seriously.
“As public officials and their families across the country face an alarming increase in violent threats, rhetoric and harassment, Gov. Pritzker signed the bipartisan Public Official Safety and Privacy Act into law to help protect the safety of Illinois public officials at every level of local and state government,” the spokesperson said in a statement.
Democratic state Sen. Adriane Johnson of Buffalo Grove, the law’s Senate sponsor, said those realities demanded action.
“I hear the concerns,” Johnson said about the transparency and accountability issues. “Not to diminish or downplay the concern by reporters and others, but to me, it is critically important that we allow legislators to have their personal information, contact information removed if they so choose.”
The statute applies to a wide range of public officials — constitutional officers, state’s attorneys, county clerks, public defenders, members of boards of election commissioners, and both current and former state lawmakers. Anyone who unlawfully publishes a public official’s or their family’s personal information online could face a felony charge — and a sentence of two to five years in prison — if the person knew or should have known the posting of the information posed an imminent and serious threat and if the violation is a proximate cause of injury or death.
To invoke the protections, an official or their representative must submit a written request identifying the information to be removed. Businesses and individuals have a few days to comply; government agencies have five. Addresses for elected officials and candidates running for public office across the state have already been removed from front-facing web pages and spreadsheets maintained by the Illinois State Board of Elections.
Carolyn Iodice, legislative and policy director for the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression, said the law’s structure invites misuse.
“While I don’t think the intent of lawmakers here is to suppress news or criticism, the fact is, the law is extremely amenable to abuse for those purposes,” Iodice said.
Reporters investigating whether a lawmaker lives outside their district could be forced to remove their reporting or face legal action. A similar statute in New Jersey was used by city officials in New Brunswick to successfully sue and prevent a journalist from publishing the address of a top law enforcement official to show that the official lived more than two hours from the community he served.
Johnson, the Senate sponsor, said such cases are rare and claimed the State Board of Elections would identify residency violations, though the board has long lacked the staffing necessary to investigate residency discrepancies. Johnson also said constituents could still file complaints if they suspect an official does not live in the appropriate district.
John Patterson, spokesperson for Democratic Senate President Don Harmon, said the recently passed law can be amended if needed, but added that such concerns weren’t previously voiced.
“This is the first we’ve heard of any potential issues. We’re always willing to consider clarifications if warranted,” Patterson said in an emailed statement. “To the best of my knowledge, those hypothetical concerns have not emerged. Violence targeted against public officials is a very real threat in our society today.”
The law’s reach extends beyond residency.
Vogus, of the Freedom of the Press Foundation, said officials accused of domestic violence or extramarital affairs could force the removal of news articles or online posts mentioning such allegations since they would disclose the officials’ marital status, which is defined by the statute as personal information.
“It sends an extremely chilling message to reporters,” she said. “Politicians have a powerful tool to go after them, to potentially sue them for posting news articles that are completely true and that are revealing something really important that Illinois citizens have a right to know.”
Stuart, the House sponsor, said allegations of abuse are not proven facts and, when she was asked whether a lawmaker should be able to remove an article detailing proven abuse that did not name the spouse, she said the question was highly technical and bordered on sensational journalism. In practice, journalists typically avoid publishing home addresses or identifying victims of domestic abuse. But critics argue the law does not distinguish between responsible editorial judgment and censorship.
Concerns about safety are not unique to Illinois. About 40 state capitols now require security screenings with metal detectors, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. Following Hortman’s assassination, several states moved to shield lawmakers’ home addresses. At least five — Arizona, Florida, Idaho, Texas and Washington — allow legislators to withhold their addresses from public records requests. The Illinois State Capitol has metal detectors, with armed security throughout the building, following a 2004 incident in which a gunman fatally shot an unarmed security guard.
Louisa Duggan, policy director for the Vote Mama Foundation, which researches and supports mothers who serve as lawmakers, said elected officials should not feel they are endangering their families by serving.
“It’s targeting people who are choosing to serve, especially those with young families at home,” Duggan said. “They don’t want to worry about their kids while they’re on the campaign trail.”
But Iodice said Illinois lawmakers already have tools to address security threats without restricting public information. Laws against stalking, conspiracy and incitement are on the books, and the new statute also allows officials to use campaign funds for personal and home security upgrades.
Iodice added that she believes the law would struggle to withstand a constitutional challenge because of its sweeping scope.
“It’s not that the government officials can’t do anything here, but they cannot take steps that would censor wide swaths of information that aren’t at all necessary to protect them,” Iodice said.