Illinois becomes the first state in the U.S. to ban book bans

With the strokes of multiple pens, Gov. JB Pritzker made Illinois the first state in the nation to withhold funding from public libraries if they ban books.

“Book bans are about censorship, marginalizing people, marginalizing ideas and facts,” Pritzker declared at the Harold Washington Library, the crown jewel of Chicago’s public library system. “Regimes ban books, not democracies.”