Illinois is one step away from strengthening protections for wild animals used in circuses and other traveling shows, as lawmakers move to expand the state’s existing ban beyond elephants to include lions, tigers, bears, non-human primates, and several other species.
House Bill 4255 will add cougars, jaguars, leopards, lions, tigers, non-human primates, bears, and any hybrids of those animals to the list of species barred from use in traveling acts. The measure now heads to Governor JB Pritzker for final approval.
The bill builds on legislation passed in 2017 to ban the use of elephants in circuses and other traveling exhibitions that cannot meet animals’ needs.
In a statement from State Senator Linda Holmes, she underscored the grim reality for the animals used in these shows: They spend much of their lives in cramped, filthy cages, while enduring “severe and chronic stress.”
In addition, animals used for public handling are typically taken from their mothers shortly after birth and subjected to stress, neglect, and mistreatment tied to hand-raising and repeated contact with visitors.
While this bill is an important step, it stops short of challenging all forms of captive wild-animal exhibition, by preserving an exemption for zoos and other permanent USDA-licensed facilities — as long as the animals are not used in traveling performances. That limitation leaves many wild animals outside the law’s protections, even when their confinement and use raise serious welfare concerns.
Still, this is a step toward progress: With county fair and festival season approaching, LFT is grateful that the state of Illinois will no longer tolerate this kind of neglect and cruelty in traveling shows.
