On October 30, the Liberty Justice Center filed a motion for a preliminary injunction in its legal challenge to Senate Bill 3649 (SB 3649), Illinois’ recently enacted employer speech ban. The motion urges the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois to grant an order prohibiting the state from enacting and enforcing SB 3649 while litigation continues.
The Liberty Justice Center filed a lawsuit to challenge SB 3649 in August, arguing that the misleadingly titled “Worker Freedom of Speech Act” effectively revokes free speech rights across the state. SB 3649’s broad, vague language would prohibit employers from discussing any “religious or political matters” in mandatory meetings—even when such matters are essential to the organization’s operations or to employees’ work—and would impose thousands of dollars in fines for any such discussion.
Today’s legal filing asks the court to halt enforcement of SB 3649 before the legislation takes effect on January 1, 2025.
The Liberty Justice Center also filed an amended complaint announcing the addition of a second plaintiff to the lawsuit. The Technology & Manufacturing Association (TMA)—an independent trade organization of nearly 1,000 small and midsize manufacturing businesses across Illinois—is joining the legal challenge to SB 3649 on behalf of its member businesses.
The lawsuit is brought against Jane R. Flanagan, the Director of the Illinois Department of Labor—the agency tasked with enforcing SB 3649—in her official capacity.
“The Supreme Court has repeatedly held that content-based restrictions on speech—restrictions that apply to certain speech based on its topic, idea, or message—presumptively violate the First Amendment. Yet the state of Illinois has attempted to ban employer speech based solely on its content: speech that is political or religious,” said Jeffrey Schwab, Senior Counsel at the Liberty Justice Center. “The court should prevent this unconstitutional law from going into effect.”
Illinois Policy Institute v. Flanagan was filed in the United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois, Eastern Division, on August 8, 2024.
The Liberty Justice Center’s legal filings in Illinois Policy Institute v. Flanagan are available here.