SB1909 passed out of committee with an amendment on March 29, and the amended bill passed the full Illinois Senate on March 30.
The committee vote was along party lines: 9-4. Pro-life advocates filed 8942 witness slips opposing the bill, while pro-abortion witness slips only totaled 2725. The vote in the full senate was 36-19, also along party lines.
As introduced, SB1909 would penalize PRCs for using "deception, fraud, false pretense, false promise, or misrepresentation, or the concealment, suppression, or omission of any material fact" with the intent to "interfere" with a person trying to access abortion or "emergency contraception." Pro-life advocates fear that the bill could be used to penalize pregnancy centers that don't refer women for abortions.
Further, the bill as introduced empowered the Illinois Attorney General to launch investigations into PRCs whenever he "believes it to be in the public interest that an investigation should be made to ascertain whether a limited services pregnancy center has engaged in, is engaging in, or is about to engage in, any practice declared to be unlawful by the Act." These investigations could continue endlessly, and they allow courts to seize PRC documents. Given enough time, such investigations could force PRCs to shut their doors.
Even third parties who have never been clients or patients would also be empowered to file lawsuits against PRCs. The bill does not provide for the recovery of attorney fees when a lawsuit is brought against a PRC in bad faith.
If found guilty, PRCs would face fines of up to $50,000 per violation.
The amendment passed on March 29 softened the bill somewhat. Language empowering the attorney general to launch investigations whenever he saw fit was removed from the bill. The remainder of the legislation appears to be very similar. We will provide updates as we learn more.
SB1909 has now been sent to the House for consideration. HB2463, SB1909's sister bill that was introduced in the House still contains the original language. The House could choose to push either bill. If the bills passed by the house and senate are different, then the Illinois General Assembly will need to reconcile those differences before sending a bill to pro-abortion Gov. JB Pritzker for signature.
