On February 15th the bipartisan Joint Committee on Administrative Rules (JCAR) voted 9-0-2 to block the re-implementation of Governor JB Pritzker’s mask mandate for K-12 public and private schools in Illinois.
“A statewide mask mandate for schools is no longer in effect following today’s suspension by JCAR,” said Rep. Meier. “For nearly two years the governor has ignored legislative input concerning his covid mitigations. Fortunately, when a bipartisan committee of both representatives and senators had the opportunity to weigh in, they voted against the governor’s statewide school mask mandate. With the governor’s school mask mandate null and void, it’s now up to our local school boards to decide what is in the best interest of their students.”
Governor Pritzker’s emergency rule on COVID mitigations for Illinois schools expired on Sunday, February 13. The Administration immediately re-filed the rule on Monday, putting it back into effect unless JCAR voted affirmatively to block it with a minimum of 8 members on the 12-member committee. Nine members voted to suspend the Governor’s emergency rule, with zero voting to keep it in place and two members voting “Present.”