Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker signs 2 gun safety laws as officials weigh in on drop in crime in Chicago
Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker on Monday signed two bills seeking to target crime and strengthen safety around guns.
This comes with another hot summer weekend in the books in Chicago as the trendline continues — with violent crime dropping significantly in the city.
In 2023, the last weekend of July saw 47 people were shot in Chicago. In 2025, there were 21 people shot in the city — less than half.
In the last week of July two years ago, there were five murders in the city. This year, there were two.
What is behind the jaw-dropping reductions? It depends on who is being asked.
"It's hard to pinpoint," said Gov. Pritzker.
Pritzker acknowledged there is no one reason Chicago's homicide rate is down 3% from last year, shootings down 40%, and carjackings down 50%.
On Monday, Pritzker signed into law two bills targeting crime. One requires Illinois police departments share more information on guns found at crime scenes with other law enforcement, while the other strengthens gun storage laws.
The Safe Gun Storage Act, SB 0008, seeks to prevent access to guns by children, at-risk individuals, and people prohibited from having guns. The governor's office said the law outlines improved safe storage requirements, adds civil penalties for improper storage security, and strengthens rules around lost or stolen gun reporting.
The new law requires gun owners to report a lost or stolen gun within 48 hours of discovery, down from 72 hours.
"This is a commonsense measure that has been shown to significantly reduce gun deaths, suicides, and accidental shootings," Gov. Pritzker said Monday.
HB 1373 strengthens firearm tracing in all instances where guns are used unlawfully, associated with a grime, or recovered at a crime scene, the governor's office said. The law requires every law enforcement agency in Illinois to participate in the federal eTrace program, which ensures consistent reporting statewide.
As for what is behind the drop in this year's numbers, Illinois Kwame Raoul credited violence interruption programs.
"A hundred million dollars for violence interruption — that works," said Raoul. "It works."
Violence interrupters are individuals with credibility in often-violent communities who are strategically placed to de-escalate situations before they overheat.
Meanwhile, John Roman from the nonpartisan National Opinion Research Center at the University of Chicago had another hypothesis for why crime has dropped. He pointed to the COVID pandemic, and the number of local government employees who ended up off the job as a result, compared with the number working today.
"The number of local government employees across the country fell by more than a million in three months — March to May 2020 — and it has been slowly coming back ever since," Roman said, "and now there are actually more local government employees pre-pandemic, and the track of these increases in local government jobs exactly matches the decline in violence we see around the country."
Roman credits violence interrupters funded with fresh corporate dollars, and more data-driven police work — which is paying off with drops happening faster than anyone forecasted.
"I mean, crime decline has been so rapid that it's hard to imagine it continues at this pace," said Roman.
The decline is being seen across the country, but Chicago is leading the pack. Many elected officials taking credit for the drops.
Roman said at this point, those officials can take any credit they want as long as the drop in crime continues.
No action yet on bill that would streamline FOID cards for lowest-level gun offenders
Meanwhile Monday, no action was taken on another bill, Illinois SB 1899, that would make it easier for the state's lowest-level gun offenders to obtain Firearm Owners Identification cards.
This law allows people with the least severe gun charges to complete diversion programs as an alternative to criminal prosecution, and to apply for a FOID card once they have a court order attesting that they have completed the diversion program. State police would then grant the FOID card once the felony charge is dropped, published reports explained.
The Cook County State's Attorney's office is in favor of the legislation.
SB 1899 has been approved by the Illinois General Assembly, but remains on Gov. Pritzker's desk.