SPRINGFIELD, Ill. — The Illinois House on Wednesday approved a measure that would allow the Illinois secretary of state’s office to deny grant funding to public and school libraries if they ban books or fail to devise policies against removing titles from their stacks.
The 69-39 party-line vote in the Democratic-led House reflected the partisan divide on the book-banning issue both in the state and nationally. The bill will now move to the Senate for consideration.
Illinois has not seen as many cases of book bans or attempted bans as states that lean more Republican, according to some research. But according to the secretary of state’s office, citing figures from the Chicago-based American Library Association, there were 67 attempts to ban books in Illinois in 2022, up from 41 the year before.
