The American Alliance for Equal Rights has filed a suit against the State of Illinois arguing that a diversity affirmation law required of nonprofits violates the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution.
The law requires nonprofits that report grants of $1 million or more to “other charitable organizations to publicly list aggregated demographic information of their directors and officers online, including directors’ and officers’ race, ethnicity, gender, disability status, veteran status, sexual orientation and gender identity.”
The law also requires that state’s Department of Human Rights to work “with community partners to prepare and publish a standardized list of demographic classifications to be used by the Secretary of State and (nonprofit) corporations for the reporting of the aggregated demographic information.”
The law went into effect January 1. The suit was filed in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois Eastern Division. A copy of the complaint can be found here. https://www.courthousenews.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/01/edward-blum-demography-suit.pdf
Illinois is the first and right now only state to require nonprofits to publicize demographic data online. While the law demands only aggregate data, to get the data directors and officers must be asked to provide information including their race, ethnicity, gender, disability status, veteran status, sexual orientation, and gender identity.
The organizations used in the suit are characterized as Members A and B. According to the suit, those are pseudonymous because “they fear Illinois will retaliate against them for opposing SB 2930. Members A and B also fear that other organizations will be unwilling to partner with them, potential employees will be unwilling to work for them, and donations will decrease if their participation in this litigation becomes public,” it is argued in the suit.
The organization contends that “SB 2930 offends perhaps an even more important right: the constitutional right to be free from state-ordered racial discrimination. By forcing nonprofits to publicize their demographic data, SB 2930 pressures them to discriminate when choosing board members. That discrimination is by design: The law’s sponsors drafted SB 2930 to ‘encourage more diversity’ in the nonprofit sector, and Illinois’ governor signed it for that very reason.”
The law requires that the aggregated demographic information be accessible on the corporation’s publicly available website for at least three years after it is posted.
The complaint names as defendants Illinois Attorney General Kwame Raoul, Director of the Illinois Department of Human Rights James Bennett, and Illinois Secretary of State of State Alexi Giannoulias.
Edward Blum is president of the American Alliance for Equal Rights. The organization has filed more than a dozen lawsuits challenging the use of race by corporations, law firms, venture capital firms, and cultural institutions. It is described on the organizational website as “dedicated to challenging distinctions and preferences made on the basis of race and ethnicity.”
Blum is described online as an American conservative legal strategist who since the 1990s has been involved in bringing eight cases to the United States Supreme Court.[2] He was a key figure in Bush v. Vera and the Students for Fair Admissions v. President and Fellows of Harvard College lawsuits. He is also director of the Project on Fair Representation, which he founded in 2005.
