Illinois enacts limits on civil immigration enforcement
Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker on Tuesday signed HB 1312 in Chicago, creating new limits on civil immigration enforcement at courthouses, hospitals, day cares and university campuses statewide. The law restricts civil arrests around certain court proceedings, tightens privacy and law‑enforcement interaction policies at hospitals, limits status‑sharing by universities and day cares, mandates protocols for handling federal agents by early 2026, and allows individuals to sue officers over alleged rights violations. The White House and DHS criticized the measure, citing the Constitution’s Supremacy Clause, signaling potential legal conflict with federal enforcement.
📌 Key Facts
- HB 1312 signed Dec. 9, 2025 at Chicago’s Little Village.
- Bans civil arrests in and around courthouses for attendees of specified state proceedings.
- Requires hospitals to adopt policies governing interactions with law enforcement.
- Restricts universities and day cares from sharing immigration status except when required by law; protocols due by early 2026.
- Creates a private right of action to sue officers for alleged constitutional violations.
- White House and DHS condemned the law, invoking the Supremacy Clause.
📊 Relevant Data
The estimated unauthorized immigrant population in Illinois in 2023 is 588,000, representing about 4.7% of the state's total population of approximately 12.5 million.
Profile of the Unauthorized Population: Illinois — Migration Policy Institute
70% of unauthorized immigrants in Illinois are from Mexico and Central America, with Mexico accounting for 60% of the total unauthorized population.
Profile of the Unauthorized Population: Illinois — Migration Policy Institute
Undocumented immigrants have felony arrest rates approximately half that of native-born US citizens for violent crimes, based on 2012-2018 data from Texas, with native-born rates around 1,000 per 100,000 compared to 400 per 100,000 for undocumented immigrants.
Comparing crime rates between undocumented immigrants, legal immigrants, and native-born US citizens in Texas — Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS)
From April 2020 to July 2024, the Chicago metropolitan area received 238,000 international migrants, which helped stabilize the population despite a net domestic outmigration of 347,466 residents.
Chicago area gets over 96K international migrants in 2024; 238K since 2020 — Illinois Policy Institute
In ICE operations in the Chicago area between June and mid-October 2025, only 16 out of 607 detained individuals were identified as having criminal histories, representing 2.6% of those detained.
Only 16 of over 600 detained by ICE in Chicago area have criminal histories, records show — CBS News