The General Assembly has sent a total of 599 Bills to the Governor’s Office this year. Governor J.B. Pritzker signed over 50 Bills in the last week, and still has 167 Bills to take action on before the months end.
Bills signed into law by the Governor last week included House Bill 253, which allows graduate student assistant teachers to unionize beginning Jan. 1, 2020. These employees were defined as students in previous Illinois law, which prevented them from unionizing.
Senate Bill 1411 aims to provide more transparency for sexual assault victims who are awaiting the processing of rape kits by creating a real-time electronic tracking system for sexual assault evidence processing.
Per the law, the statewide system will be hosted online, have a 24-hour help desk and provide real-time updates. The Illinois State Police has one year from the signing of the bill, which passed both chambers unanimously, to implement the system.
Among recent actions, the governor exercised his fourth veto, this time on Senate Bill 2126, but he took the action because the bill was identical to House Bill 3628, which he already signed.
All of the remaining unsigned bills were officially sent to the governor the week ending June 28th. So he has a little over one week to act and be within the 60-day statutory window.
The governor has the authority to veto any legislation, but any bill he does not either sign or veto will automatically become law once the 60-day period ends.