CHAMPAIGN — Student activists at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign are celebrating a new state law they helped enact.
Gov. JB Pritzker signed a law Friday that requires public universities to offer contraceptives and medication abortion starting this school year.
“I know that if I had gotten pregnant and could not terminate that pregnancy, things would have ended up very differently for me,” said recent University of Illinois graduate Emma Darbro.
Darbro was president of the U of I Planned Parenthood chapter in 2022 when the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade. She helped write a referendum for U of I undergraduates asking whether they wanted access to abortion pills. Around three-quarters of the 6,354 student voters supported the idea.
The campus health center was not receptive.
The University of Illinois McKinley Health Center previously told IPM News it did not have the expertise to provide abortions and would refer students to other providers nearby.
Sydney Turner also helped write the student referendum. She was the health policy director of the student Planned Parenthood group at the time.
“We provide free and accessible services to students for ibuprofen. And if we were to say, ‘That’s available at the local pharmacy, you don’t need it at the Student Health Center,’ the same [logic] wouldn’t apply. It’s about recognizing it as essential health care that makes the difference,” Turner said.
Darbro said the Champaign Planned Parenthood location was also receiving clients from all over— and that it would be helpful if students did not have to add to that caseload.
Darbro started connecting with legislators almost accidentally, she said. She signed up for a lobbying day where she was supposed to advocate for university funding, but she walked into a meeting with her state representative, Harry Benton, with her own agenda.
“I’m like, ‘The University of Illinois system wants money, and I want abortion pills on campus.’ This was 2022 or 2023. I went so off script,” she said.
In October, Darbro spoke at an Illinois Department of Public Health conference. Gov. Pritzker’s staff heard her frustration with McKinley not following the lead to student voices. They later reached out to her about turning it into a bill and asked her to testify in support.
The bill passed in the spring legislative session, and on Friday, Pritzker signed it into law at a press conference at U of I.
“The energy that lights up this movement comes from the student advocates,” Pritzker said. “You have helped to deliver real positive change for young women across the state of Illinois. I think you are the future of this state, and I must say it means that we have a bright future indeed.”
State Senator Celina Villanueva co-sponsored HB3709. She’s met the students multiple times and said she was in awe from the first time she met them.
She said her next efforts related to abortion rights will be related to data privacy and protecting patients who get abortions from Illinois providers, including those who travel from out of state.
“There’s a big concern that information is being bought when you’re signing up for things on your phone, or if you’re crossing state lines. We’re trying to make sure that people’s information stays their information and isn’t sold in a way that can be exploited in a way that is trying to criminalize people,” Villanueva said.
Darbro and Turner have both graduated from the U of I and are moving onto their next chapters.
Turner works full-time at an abortion rights organization and is on the board of Educate Us, an organization that focuses on sex education. She wants to pursue a PhD in communication with the same focus.
Darbro is moving states Saturday to work at the electronic health records company Epic. She said she eventually wants to go to medical school to become a gynecologist for family planning and abortion care.
Pritzker also signed another bill on Friday to protect healthcare providers from being prosecuted for procedures like abortion that are legal in Illinois.