Dangerous Prescedent: Illinois Mandates 'Mental Health' Testing For All Students

Children's minds are now officially in the crosshairs of one of the most out-of-control state governments in America. Under a controversial new measure just signed into law by far-left Governor J.B. Pritzker, government schools in Illinois will begin mandatory "mental health" testing of all students each year, starting in 3rd grade.

Critics are sounding the alarm. Among other concerns, they are warning that Big Brother cannot be trusted to pry into the minds of children. From education leaders and privacy advocates to psychiatrists and medical professionals, opponents of the plan say it will intrude into the most sensitive areas of a child's life.

"(Screenings) provide early identification and intervention, so that those who are struggling get the help that they need as soon as possible," Gov. Pritzker, a leading proponent of transgenderism, said at the signing ceremony. "They improve academic and social outcomes. They help us break down the stigma that, too often, is a barrier to seeking help."

One major goal is to "normalize" so-called "mental health care" for children and adolescents, explained Democrat State Senator Laura Fine, the chief sponsor of the bill. "The screenings will be designed to catch the early signs of anxiety, depression or trauma before it becomes a crisis or, in some cases, sometimes too late," she said.

While Illinois is the first state to do it with SB 1560, Big Pharma lobbyists hoping to profit from drugging children are working overtime to get similar schemes passed in other jurisdictions. Even some Republican-run state governments are moving in that direction. And with pharmaceutical interests pouring money into political campaigns, the clock is ticking.  

Illinois State Superintendent Tony Sanders, a radical leftist, claimed the program was critical to helping children succeed. "Mental health is essential to academic readiness and lifelong success," he argued in a statement released after the legislation was signed into law, as if children never succeeded before the program was launched.

"Too often, we only recognize a student's distress when it becomes a crisis," continued Sanders. "With universal screening, we shift from reaction to prevention. The earlier we identify a need, the better support we can provide to that student to help them thrive -- in school and in life."

The exact details of the program will be worked out by the state board of education over the next year. Before September 2026, the bureaucracy is supposed to create "guidance" on the screenings, referrals for follow ups by mental-health professionals, and protecting the privacy of student data. Parents can opt out under the bill, for now. It all begins in 2027.

Celebrated actress and author Sam Sorbo, a prominent advocate of home education and a vocal critic of government schools, told The Newman Report that the new mental-health testing regime was a recipe for disaster.  "Our schools have become even more dangerous than before," she warned.

"Instead of working to improve academic results in our schools, they seek to delve into the personal, private, intimate details of their young charges, potentially learning key information to use against them or to groom them at some later date," continued Sorbo, whose most recent book is Parents' Guide to Homeschool: Making Education Easy and Fun.

Legendary Harvard-trained psychiatrist Dr. Peter Breggin, celebrated worldwide for his war on quackery such as lobotomies and electro-shock "therapy," sounded the alarm about the Illinois plan as well. Among other concerns, he blasted the collaboration between Big Pharma and organized psychiatry to invade schools and "make a market out of children."

"This will lead to the mass medicalization of children -- even more than is already being done to them -- and create a storehouse on distorted psychiatric data and diagnoses that can ruin their lives," he told this writer as the plan was being considered last year, pointing to various diagnoses used by psychiatrists to drug children unnecessarily.

Dr. Breggin warned that the psychiatric drugs are neuro-toxic chemicals that do not address the real causes of mental problems. Indeed, as acknowledged by the manufacturers themselves, many of those drugs have horrific side effects including suicidal and homicidal ideation -- the very things they are supposed to help treat.

The Illinois scheme will produce even more "mass medicalization of children," with all of the negative implications that come with it. "Nothing is worse than telling a child they have a mental problem, first because it demoralizes them, and second because the problem, if there is one, is corrected by improving how we relate to them," he said.

"The idea of screening school children for mental problems is equivalent to screening them for the drug market," continued Breggin, a longtime opponent of the psychiatric drugs. "This will stigmatize increasing numbers of children, lead many of them to taking dangerous psychiatric drugs, and push some into a lifetime 'career' as mental patients."

The suggestion that Big Pharma is looking for more "patients" to milk is backed by data. Illinois politicians, like their counterparts across the country, receive enormous campaign contributions from pharmaceutical companies. Indeed, over 80 percent of the state's lawmakers received campaign cash from the industry, an analysis by STAT news showed.

Author Abigail Shrier, who recently exposed the transgender madness overtaking the nation's youth, lambasted the Illinois program, too. "I want to be on-the-record and crystal clear. This is a disastrous policy that will do vastly more harm than good," she wrote on X. "Watch as tens of thousands of Illinois kids get shoved into the mental health funnel and convinced they are sick. Many or most of which will be false positives."

This crazy plan will be a financial bonanza for Big Pharma and organized psychiatry, but a disaster for children, families, and taxpayers. Long before "mental health screenings" and drugging children at school, there was no mental health crisis. What children need is not more taxpayer-funded programs and drugs -- they need God, family, love, and truth.

Originally published at Harbinger's Daily