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1
HOUSE RESOLUTION

 
2    WHEREAS, The U.S. Department of Justice's Bureau of Justice
3Statistics found that, on average, 20.5 percent of college
4women have experienced sexual assault since entering college;
5and
 
6    WHEREAS, Moreover, the National Sexual Violence Resource
7Center estimates that more than 60 percent of sexual assaults
8are never even reported to police; and
 
9    WHEREAS, To address these issues, the U.S. Department of
10Education's Office for Civil Rights under the Obama
11administration issued guidelines that instructed universities
12that they were obligated to combat sexual assault and
13harassment under Title IX, a 1972 law prohibiting sex
14discrimination in federally-funded educational programs; and
 
15    WHEREAS, The guidelines also established a requirement
16that college disciplinary proceedings rely on a preponderance
17of evidence when adjudicating cases of sexual assault; and
 
18    WHEREAS, In 2017, the Trump administration rescinded these
19guidelines and announced its intention to engage the federal
20rulemaking process to establish new rules governing the
21schools' responsibilities concerning sexual harassment and

 

 

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1assault complaints; and
 
2    WHEREAS, Education Secretary Betsy DeVos released a
3proposed rule in November 2018 that would narrow the scope of
4allegations schools will be responsible for investigating and
5would enable schools to choose a higher legal standard for
6considering evidence; and
 
7    WHEREAS, The Education Department received more than
8100,000 public comments on the proposed rulemaking, which the
9Department is now reviewing in preparation for issuing a final
10rule; and
 
11    WHEREAS, Illinois Attorney General Kwame Raoul joined a
12coalition of 19 attorneys general in submitting a comment
13letter urging federal officials to withdraw the proposed rule,
14as it undermines the anti-discrimination protections of Title
15IX and weakens protections against sexual harassment and
16violence for students; and
 
17    WHEREAS, After passing the Preventing Sexual Violence in
18Higher Education Act in 2015, Illinois now has one of the
19strongest state laws to protect student survivors of sexual
20assault on campus; therefore, be it
 
21    RESOLVED, BY THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES OF THE ONE

 

 

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1HUNDRED FIRST GENERAL ASSEMBLY OF THE STATE OF ILLINOIS, that
2we urge Education Secretary Betsy DeVos and the Department of
3Education to withdraw the proposed rule and instead pursue
4policies that reflect the concerns raised by law enforcement,
5create a safe environment for victims to report instances,
6aggressively address the problem of campus sexual assault and
7harassment, and broadly address all instances of sexual
8harassment affecting college students; and be it further
 
9    RESOLVED, That a suitable copy of this resolution be
10delivered to Secretary DeVos.