Quick Hits

• Illinois enacted a law prohibiting discrimination against employees who must care for family members at home.
• The law will not require employers to make accommodations or modifications to reasonable workplace rules and policies to allow employees to fulfill their caregiving responsibilities.
• The law will take effect on January 1, 2025.

On August 9, 2024, Governor JB Pritzker signed House Bill (HB) 2161, Illinois’s family caregiver discrimination legislation, adding Illinois to the small but growing list of states with such protections.

Specifically, the legislation amends the state’s employment discrimination law to make it unlawful to refuse to hire, deny a promotion, or discharge an employee based on the employee’s “actual or perceived” responsibility to provide “personal care” to a family member.

‘Family Responsibilities’

HB2161 adds “family responsibilities” to the list of protected classes under the Illinois Human Rights Act. The term “family responsibilities” is defined as “an employee’s actual or perceived provision of personal care to a family member.” The law refers to definitions under the Illinois Employee Sick Leave Act, which defines “personal care” as “activities to ensure that a covered family member’s basic medical, hygiene, nutritional, or safety needs are met,” which includes transportation to/from medical appointments and emotional support for a covered family member receiving in-home care for a serious health condition. The act defines “covered family member” as “an employee’s child, stepchild, spouse, domestic partner, sibling, parent, mother-in-law, father-in-law, grandchild, grandparent, or stepparent.”

The amendments will make it unlawful for employers “to refuse to hire, to segregate, to engage in harassment … or to act with response to recruitment, hiring, promotion, renewal of employment, selection for training or apprenticeship, discharge, discipline, tenure or terms, privileges or conditions of employment on the basis of … family responsibilities.”

The law will further prohibit employment agencies from refusing to properly classify or refer individuals for employment, including internships or apprenticeships based on their family responsibilities. The law also applies to labor organizations, such as labor unions and trade groups.

The law does not require employers, employment agencies, or labor organizations to accommodate or modify their existing workplace policies related to leave, scheduling, productivity, attendance or absenteeism, timeliness, or work performance for employees with family caregiving responsibilities. Employers may take adverse action or enforce reasonable workplace rules against such employees if such actions or workplace rules do not otherwise violate the law.

Legal Landscape

HB2161 is on the cutting edge of protections for employee family responsibilities and comes after Illinois, in January 2024, began requiring employers to provide up to forty hours of paid leave per year that employees may take for any reason.

Sponsors of HB2161 had reportedly argued that specific protections against discrimination over employees’ caregiving responsibilities are necessary because employers may refuse to hire or promote job applicants based on the assumption that their family caregiving responsibilities outside of work will impede their work performance. Opponents, however, argue that the law is unnecessary and will increase employers’ liability.

Next Steps

Employers in Illinois may want to note these new protections for employees with family responsibilities and consider amending their employment discrimination processes. Employers may also want to consider updating workplace notices and handbook policies to incorporate the new legal protections.