FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Arlington, VA – On Wednesday night the Illinois Senate Executive Committee voted favorably in a 10-3 bipartisan vote to advance Senator Steve Stadelman’s (D-Rockford) Journalism Preservation Act (JPA, SB 3591), which would require Big Tech platforms such as Meta and Google to pay news publishers a “journalism usage fee” to use local news content. Currently, creators of quality journalism are not adequately compensated for the use of their content – which takes a tremendous investment to produce – leading to layoffs of journalists and, in the worst cases, closure of news outlets completely.
Importantly, among the yes votes was President of the Illinois Senate Don Harmon, who was a strong supporter at the subject matter hearing on the bill that was held earlier this year.
The bill is similar to the California Journalism Preservation Act (CJPA, AB 886), which was introduced by California Assemblymember Buffy Wicks (D-Oakland) last year and passed out of the Assembly in June 2023 with an overwhelming, bipartisan vote of 55-6.
In committee, amendments were made to the Illinois bill to change payouts from a ratio of news impressions to payouts per journalist employed; steering the funds in-state; and extra funds allocated for small publications.
As with the CJPA, the Illinois JPA would further promote the hiring of more journalists by requiring news publishers to invest 70 percent of the profits from the usage fee into journalism jobs.
“We applaud Senator Stadelman for his strong dedication to passing this legislation and to the Illinois Senate Executive Committee for recognizing the need to protect high-quality journalism, which serves a critical role in providing important news and information to Illinois communities,” said Danielle Coffey, President & CEO of the News/Media Alliance. “States like Illinois and California are leading the U.S. in taking meaningful action to require the tech platforms to come to the negotiating table and fairly compensate publishers for the use of their valuable content.”
Committee Chair Cristina Castro (D-Elgin) and Senator Linda Holmes (D-Aurora) echoed this desire for all parties to negotiate in good faith during the vote.
The Alliance has been vocally advocating for such legislation at the federal level since 2018. The federal bill, the Journalism Competition & Preservation Act (JCPA), was reintroduced in the 118th Congress (S. 1094) and successfully passed out of the Senate Judiciary Committee last summer, also on a bipartisan basis.
In a poll of 1,000 U.S. adults conducted by Schoen Cooperman Research for the News/Media Alliance, 70 percent of Americans said they support Congress passing the JCPA.
For more information on the federal JCPA, visit www.JCPABill.com.
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Media contact:
Lindsey Loving
Director, Communications
lindsey@newsmediaalliance.org
The News/Media Alliance is a nonprofit organization representing more than 2,200 news, magazine, and digital media organizations and their multiplatform businesses in the United States and globally. Alliance members include print and digital publishers of original journalism. Headquartered just outside Washington, D.C., the association focuses on ensuring the future of journalism through communication, research, advocacy, and innovation. Information about the News/Media Alliance can be found at www.newsmediaalliance.org.
Members of the News/Media Alliance staff have contributed to this post.
