Over 10 years ago, the Illinois General Assembly unanimously voted to ban our state pension systems from investing in any company that boycotts Israel. This law is morally incoherent. Illinois separately bans pension investment in Sudan over genocide, Russia and Belarus for their war of aggression in Ukraine, and companies that profit from the detention of migrant children here in the U.S. The rare times we have banned investment, it is because the targets are breaking the law or committing atrocities.
We ban investments in genocides and wars of aggression. We ban investment in the senseless cruelty to children whose only crime is being born on the wrong side of a dotted line. And in the same breath, Illinois punishes those who don’t want to fund Israel as it carries out the same crimes against humanity.
What is happening in Palestine is a genocide. Even if you cannot bring yourself to use the word, there is no one among us who can look at 74,000 dead in Gaza in the past three years without horror. Imagine someone killing every single man, woman, and child in Oak Park. And the same in River Forest. They would have to kill 10,000 more to match the scale of the death. But our laws demand that a company that protests this death with its dollars be treated like Putin’s oligarchs.
This ban is inconsistent with Oak Park values. I am from Oak Park. Oak Park cherishes life. Oak Park abhors injustice. Oak Park respects speech, including the right to disagree. The current Illinois ban does none of these.
Next month, Oak Park has a chance to vote to call on Illinois to repeal these laws. Oak Parkers know the answer to the question: “Should the state of Illinois repeal laws that ban state investment in businesses that boycott the state of Israel?”
Yes.
Sources:
Pension investment prohibitions: 40 Ill. Comp. Stat. 5/1-110.16 (available here: https://www.ilga.gov/Documents/legislation/ilcs/documents/004000050K1-110.16.htm)
AP casualty figure: https://apnews.com/article/israel-gaza-iran-israel-yemen-september-27-2026-96b100178557a28f51e2ad4f74539699
Reed Showalter
Oak Park