SB0539 Summary

• Amends the Illinois Governmental Ethics Act to add comprehensive definitions for assets, debts, creditors, economic relationships, families, income, and investment real estate relevant to financial disclosure requirements.

• Modifies lobbying definitions to align with the Lobbyist Registration Act and adds restrictions on elected officials engaging in compensated lobbying, including legislators, county officials, municipal officials, and township officials.

• Creates new ethics restrictions for appointed officials requiring divestment from candidate political committees within 30 days of Senate confirmation, with options to convert committees to limited activity status or dissolve them.

• Expands the Lobbyist Registration Act to cover municipal, county, and township government officials and actions; adds consultant registration requirements; and establishes preemption limiting local regulation of lobbying except in municipalities over 500,000 population.

• Modifies campaign finance rules in the Election Code to restrict candidate political committees for Senate-confirmed appointees, establish limited activity committees, and impose contribution limits for political committees.