West Cook News

A bill that will allow the governor full control over whether public and private schools can remain open during a public health emergency is receiving backlash from Republicans.  conservative activists.

House Bill 2789 grants Gov. J.B. Pritzker – and any future governor – through the Illinois Department of Public Health (IDPH) the authority to order a school halt in-person instruction if even one complaint of noncompliance to the IDPH's mitigation standards is made. Those standards, including occupancy limits, social distancing, symptom screening and isolation, are also placed into full control of the IDPH through the bill.

Bill Mueller, a Cook County activist, expressed his disapproval of the bill to West Cook News.

"HB2789 is a blatant push not by parents but the corrupt teachers' unions to go after home schools and private schools," Mueller said. "It's another deception play, this time by trying to fool us into thinking they are concerned about health."

The bill received strong support from two of the state's largest teachers' unions: the Illinois Federation of Teachers and the Illinois Education Association.

Prairie State Wire reported that teachers' unions have clashed with local school boards over whether it's time for in-person instruction to resume. 

Critics of the bill have called it an overreach into the decision-making power entitled to local school boards.

"HB 2789, which is now assigned to Senate Committee, is a radical bill that is heavily backed by the teachers' union and woke ideologues plain and simple," Shannon Adcock, a parent who ran for Indian Prairie School District 204, said in an April 27 Dupage Policy Journal report. "I encourage people to look at the proponents of the bill and ask yourself, 'Why are these groups wanting to exert control over religious-based/private/homeschool instruction?'"

The bill also reaches into private, Catholic and home schooling settings. Alternative schooling methods have piqued the interest of more and more parents across the country, a trend amplified by the COVID-19 pandemic. 

HB 2789 was strongly opposed by House Republicans; 42 GOP lawmakers out of 45 voted no, and the other three had excused absences. 

The bill is now with the Senate Assignments Committee.