Illinois has amended the state’s Nursing Mothers in the Workplace Act, under which employers must provide break time to an employee who needs to express breast milk for her nursing infant child each time the employee has the need to express milk for one year after the child’s birth. Beginning January 1, 2026, employers must compensate an employee during the break time at the employee’s regular rate of compensation and may not require the employee to use paid leave during the break time or reduce the employee’s compensation during the break time in any other manner. The break time must be paid unless doing so would create an undue hardship on the employer.
“Undue hardship” means an action that is prohibitively expensive or disruptive when considered in light of the following factors:
- the nature and cost of the accommodation needed;
- the overall financial resources of the facility or facilities involved in the provision of the reasonable accommodation, the number of persons employed at the facility, the effect on expenses and resources, or the impact otherwise of the accommodation upon the operation of the facility;
- the overall financial resources of the employer, the overall size of the business of the employer with respect to the number of its employees, and the number, type, and location of its facilities; and
- the type of operation or operations of the employer, including the composition, structure, and functions of the workforce of the employer, the geographic separateness, administrative, or fiscal relationship of the facility or facilities in question to the employer.
You can access the enacted bill here.