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2025 Illinois legislative session

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2025 Illinois legislative session
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General information
Scheduled session start:    January 8, 2025

Scheduled session end:    May 31, 2025

Leadership
Senate President
Don Harmon (D)

House Speaker
Chris Welch (D)
Majority Leader
Senate: Kimberly Lightford (D)
House: Robyn Gabel (D)
Minority Leader
Senate: John Curran (R)
House: Tony McCombie (R)

Elections
Next Election:    November 3, 2026

Last Election:    November 5, 2024

Previous legislative sessions
2024 • 2023 • 2022 • 2021 • 2020 • 2019 • 2018
Other 2025 legislative sessions


In 2025, the Illinois General Assembly was scheduled to convene on January 8 and adjourn on May 31.

The legislators serving in this session took office following the 2024 elections. Democrats won a 40-19 majority in the Senate and a 78-40 majority in the House. The party also controlled the governorship, creating a Democratic state government trifecta. At the start of the 2025 session, Illinois was one of seven state legislatures where neither party had a veto-proof supermajority in both chambers.

At the beginning of the 2025 legislative session:
  • Democrats held a majority in the Illinois state House and state Senate.
  • Illinois was one of 15 Democratic state government trifectas.
  • Illinois' governor was Democrat J.B. Pritzker.

    • Leadership in 2025

    See also: Leadership positions in state legislatures

    Illinois State Senate

    Illinois House of Representatives

    Partisan control in 2025

    See also: State government trifectas

    Illinois was one of 15 Democratic state government trifectas at the start of 2025 legislative sessions. A state government trifecta occurs when one political party holds the governor's office, a majority in the state Senate, and a majority in the state House. For more information about state government trifectas, click here.

    Illinois was also one of seven state legislatures where Democrats had a veto-proof supermajority in both chambers. Veto overrides occur when a legislature votes to reverse a veto issued by an executive such as a governor or the president. If one party has a majority in a state legislature that is large enough to override a gubernatorial veto without any votes from members of the minority party, it is called a veto-proof majority or, sometimes, a supermajority. To read more about veto-proof supermajorities in state legislatures, click here.

    The following tables show the partisan breakdown of the Illinois General Assembly in the 2025 legislative session.

    Illinois State Senate

    Party As of January 2025
         Democratic Party 40
         Republican Party 19
    Total 59

    Illinois House of Representatives

    Party As of January 2025
         Democratic Party 78
         Republican Party 40
    Total 118

    Regular session

    The list below shows up to 25 pieces of legislation in the 2025 legislative session that most recently passed both chambers of the legislature, were signed by the governor, or were approved by the legislature in a veto override. If no bills are displayed below, no legislation has met these criteria yet in 2025. This information is provided by BillTrack50.

    Legislation trackers

    See also: Legislation Trackers

    Ballotpedia’s legislation trackers are your go-to resource for staying on top of key legislative topics. We capture any bill introduced on the topic across all of the 50 state legislatures, and we track the movement of the bill every step of the way. We provide real-time updates and translate legislative legalese into easily understandable language. As of the 2025 session, Ballotpedia provided tracking on the following topics. Click on the links below to view related bills from the 2025 session:

    Standing legislative committees

    See also: Standing committee and List of committees in Illinois state government


    A standing committee of a state legislature is a committee that exists on a more-or-less permanent basis, from legislative session to session, that considers and refines legislative bills that fall under the committee's subject matter.

    At the beginning of the 2025 legislative session, there were 81 standing committees in Illinois' state government, including four joint legislative committees, 30 state Senate committees, and 47 state House committees.

    Joint legislative committees

    Senate committees

    House committees

    Legislatively referred constitutional amendments

    In every state but Delaware, voter approval is required to enact a constitutional amendment. In each state, the legislature has a process for referring constitutional amendments before voters. In 18 states, initiated constitutional amendments can be put on the ballot through a signature petition drive. There are also many other types of statewide measures.

    The methods by which the Illinois Constitution can be amended:

    See also: Article XIV of the Illinois Constitution and Laws governing ballot measures in Illinois

    The Illinois Constitution provides four mechanisms for amending the state constitution—a constitutional convention, a legislative process, and a citizen-initiated process.

    Initiative

    See also: Initiated constitutional amendment

    An initiated constitutional amendment is a citizen-initiated ballot measure that amends a state's constitution. Eighteen (18) states allow citizens to initiate constitutional amendments.

    In Illinois, the number of signatures required for an initiated constitutional amendment is equal to 8% of votes cast for governor in the previous gubernatorial election. Initiated measures in Illinois may only amend Article IV of the Illinois Constitution, which addresses the structure of the Illinois State Legislature. All amendments must be approved by either a majority of those voting in the election or three-fifths of those voting on the amendment itself.

    Legislature

    See also: Legislatively referred constitutional amendment

    According to Article XVI, the state Legislature can refer constitutional amendments to the ballot for voters to decide. A 60% vote is required during one legislative session for the Illinois General Assembly to place a constitutional amendment on the ballot. That amounts to a minimum of 71 votes in the Illinois House of Representatives and 36 votes in the Illinois State Senate, assuming no vacancies. Amendments do not require the governor's signature to be referred to the ballot.

    Convention

    See also: Convention-referred constitutional amendment

    According to Article XIV of the Illinois Constitution, a question about whether to hold a constitutional convention is to automatically appear on the state's ballot every 20 years starting in 1918. Illinois is one of 14 states that provides for an automatic constitutional convention question. A constitutional convention question can also be placed before the state's voters if 60% of the members of both houses of the Illinois General Assembly vote in the affirmative. If such a question does appear on the ballot, it must be affirmed by a supermajority vote of 60% of those voting on the question or a majority of those who cast a ballot for any office in that election.

    The table below shows the last and next constitutional convention question election years:

    State Interval Last question on the ballot Next question on the ballot
    Illinois 20 years 2008 2028


    Historical partisan control

    The table below depicts the historical trifecta status of Illinois.

    Illinois Party Control: 1992-2025
    Nineteen years of Democratic trifectas  •  Two years of Republican trifectas
    Scroll left and right on the table below to view more years.

    Year 92 93 94 95 96 97 98 99 00 01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25
    Governor R R R R R R R R R R R D D D D D D D D D D D D R R R R D D D D D D D
    Senate D R R R R R R R R R R D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D
    House D D D R R D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D

    Historical Senate control

    Democrats won control of the Illinois State Senate in 2002. In 2024, they won a 40-19 majority.

    The table below shows the partisan history of the Illinois Senate following every general election from 1992 to 2024. All data from 2006 or earlier comes from Michael Dubin's Party Affiliations in the State Legislatures (McFarland Press, 2007). Data after 2006 was compiled by Ballotpedia staff.

    Illinois State Senate election results: 1992-2024

    Year '92 '94 '96 '98 '00 '02 '04 '06 '08 '10 '12 '14 '16 '18 '20 '22 '24
    Democrats 27 26 28 27 27 32 31 37 37 35 40 39 37 40 41 40 40
    Republicans 32 33 31 32 32 27 27 22 22 23 19 20 22 19 18 19 19

    Before 1992

    From 1900 to 2022, the Illinois State Senate switched partisan control nine times.

    Historical House control

    Democrats won control of the Illinois House of Representatives in 1996. In 2024, they won a 78-40 majority.

    The table below shows the partisan history of the Illinois House following every general election from 1992 to 2024. All data from 2006 or earlier comes from Michael Dubin's Party Affiliations in the State Legislatures (McFarland Press, 2007). Data after 2006 was compiled by Ballotpedia staff.

    Illinois House of Representatives election results: 1992-2024

    Year '92 '94 '96 '98 '00 '02 '04 '06 '08 '10 '12 '14 '16 '18 '20 '22 '24
    Democrats 67 54 60 62 62 66 65 66 70 64 71 71 67 74 73 78 78
    Republicans 51 64 58 56 56 52 53 52 48 54 47 47 51 44 45 40 40

    Before 1992

    From 1900 to 2022, the Illinois House of Representatives switched partisan control 15 times.


    Analysis

    Adopted legislation, 2011-2024

    See also: The State Legislative Decade - Illinois

    In 2024, Ballotpedia released analysis of bills enacted in each state in the preceding decade. The charts and table below detail legislation passed each year by party sponsorship.

    See also

    Elections Illinois State Government State Legislatures State Politics
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    Illinois State Flag-Close Up.jpg
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    State Courts-Tile image.png

    External links

    Footnotes

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