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The exact number of threats is not known, but several libraries
in northern Illinois are known to have received them. No
injuries have been reported and, at least at this point, police
have been able to determine the threats were not credible.
“What the hell is wrong with people,” Giannoulias said at a
Friday news conference. “You’re threatening to bomb libraries
because you have librarians doing their job, which is nurturing
kids. We should be putting librarians on a pedestal. To me it's
a sad, sad week for Illinois and a sad week for our country.”
Giannoulias spearheaded the effort to pass a law punishing
libraries that ban books. The governor signed the measure in
June that allows withholding state funding to public or school
libraries, the first state in the country to do so.
The measure, which takes effect Jan. 1, says public libraries
must adopt the American Library Association’s (ALA) Library Bill
of Rights or their own statement prohibiting book banning.
The association’s Library Bill of Rights states that reading
materials “should not be proscribed or removed because of
partisan or doctrinal disapproval” or “excluded because of the
origin, background, or views of those contributing to their
creation.”
State Rep. Blaine Wilhour, R-Beecher City, said that is a false
narrative of the left because there was never any talk of
banning books.
“Nobody is banning anything,” Wilhour said. “I have yet to see
one of these books that is not still available to be sold and
purchased. That's a book ban. This isn’t a book ban, this is
about age appropriate.”
Wilhour is part of the Illinois Freedom Caucus, which called on
public libraries in the state to withdraw from the Chicago-based
ALA after their new president proclaimed herself to be a Marxist
on Twitter.
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