***SIGN THIS PETITION IF YOU SUPPORT ILLINOIS DCFS BEING INVESTIGATED BY THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT*** 

HEADLINE: The U.S. Attorney’s Office Must Not Allow Illinois Politics to Interfere with DCFS Being Held Accountable for Highly-Credible Allegations of Government Misconduct, Abuse of Authority, and Violating the Constitutionally Protected Civil Rights of Children and Parents

The June 8, 2026 letter signed by 111 former Assistant U.S. Attorneys (AUSA), which alleged that “once-forbidden political considerations are infecting prosecutorial decisions” at the  U.S. Attorney’s Office in the Northern District of Illinois and urged “the public to raise their voices to ensure that the office’s essential mission remains the pursuit of justice" has inspired this letter. We are members of the public and public servants answering that call.

We are parents, grandparents, friends, and neighbors from all across the political and socioeconomic spectrums. We write because there has been and continues to be a grievous injustice perpetrated against countless Illinois families, causing great harm to innocent children and innocent parents.

If the U.S. Attorney’s Office’s “sole goal is to do justice” and its “client is justice itself,” as U.S. District Judge April M. Perry stated on May 21 and as was noted in the former AUSA’s letter, then regardless of who leads the Northern District of Illinois U.S. Attorney’s Office, the individuals involved in the conduct which we now highlight must be thoroughly investigated and, where warranted, prosecuted without whatever “political considerations”, if any, are being alleged to exist.

We expect the 111 former AUSAs who signed the June 8, 2026 letter will agree and hopefully sign our letter/petition as well.

For at least the past two years, the Illinois Department of Children and Family Services (DCFS) has allegedly engaged in conduct that appears to constitute a clear, brazen, and flagrant violation of not only Illinois law, but the public trust and the constitutionally protected civil rights of parents by utilizing DCFS employees hired in the state position of “Children and Family Service Intern” (Intern) to perform the duties of fully-qualified and certified employees holding the position/office/title of “Child Protection Specialist” aka “Child Protective Investigator ”. In some cases, these Interns played a central role in erroneous decisions to indicate parents as perpetrators of child abuse or neglect. Evidence even suggests that some Interns may have exercised protective-custody authority recklessly and without proper legal authorization leading to devastating and extended family separations. Additionally, there are documented instances of Interns unlawfully using the title of the lawful Investigator positions to provide inaccurate and/or false statements to the local State’s Attorney, who proceeded to aggressively prosecute wrongfully accused parents. What is also very concerning is the real possibility of children suffering from abuse whom a DCFS Intern failed to protect after being assigned an investigation, which the Intern was not qualified to conduct.

Overwhelming evidence indicates that DCFS Interns are not qualified or legally empowered to carry out the duties and exercise the authority of DCFS employees holding the position/office/title of Child Protective Investigator/Child Protection Specialist and includes the following:

1. The sworn Declaration of Kimberly Bates, DCFS Deputy Director of Employee Services, filed in federal court under penalty of perjury in 2024, which states: (1) “Interns are child protection staff who meet the educational requirements for an Investigator position but [do] not have the requisite years of experience and may eventually move into Investigator positions”; and, (2) “Interns are individuals who meet the educational requirements for an Investigator position, but do not meet the experience requirements.”

2. The sworn Declaration of Heidi Dalenberg, longtime plaintiffs’ counsel on the BH Consent Decree against DCFS, former partner at the law firm of Riley Safer Holmes & Cancila LLP, and the current Director of the Institutional Reform Project at the ACLU, which states: “In a telephone call on Monday, June 12, 2017, which included the Department’s counsel, DCFS employee Mike Ruppe, and Plaintiffs’ counsel, Plaintiffs’ counsel were informed that the Department at that time had between 60 and 70 interns performing investigations. Plaintiffs’ counsel further were informed that the interns were individuals who did not meet all job qualifications for the position of investigator…”.

3. The Department of Central Management Services’ (CMS) official Position Description documents called CMS-104s, which, according to state records, “serve as the cornerstone of the Classification Plan in assigning jobs to specific titles” and is the “official legal document of record outlining the responsibilities and authorities to be carried out by [a position’s] incumbent”, show that in order to qualify for the position/office/title “Child Protection Specialist”, which has the DCFS working titles of “Child Protection Investigator”, “Deferred Assignment Child Protection Investigator”, “Deferred Assignment Investigator”, under the heading “Minimum Qualifications”:  “requires a bachelor’s degree in a related human service field, in criminal justice, criminal justice administration, or law enforcement and two years of directly related professional experience” among other equivalent minimum qualifications.

The State of Illinois’ official Position Description (CMS-104) for the “Children and Family Service Intern – Option 1 Bachelor’s Degree” which has the DCFS working title of “Child Protection Trainee” outlines “Essential Functions” aka “the responsibilities and authorities to be carried out” to include: “[p]articipates in a trainee program from 6 to 12 months, but up to a maximum of 24 months to obtain additional training and experience”; “[u]ndergoes on-the-job training of agency field services and administrative services to obtain hands-on experience of agency operations”; “[d]evelops working skills to advance in completing projects of increased complexity involving academic knowledge coupled with on-the-job training”.

Nowhere does the official Position Description (CMS-104) for DCFS’s “Children and Family Service Intern” include the words “Investigator”, “investigates”, or “investigation” and it certainly does not include the phrase “taking protective custody”. All of those words are included under the “Essential Functions” of the “Child Protection Specialist” position. A DCFS Intern performing the “Essential Functions” of a “Child Protection Specialist” is working outside of their class/classification which raises very serious concerns regarding compliance with Illinois law and the constitutional rights of children and parents as well as violations of the “merit-based” hiring laws of the State of Illinois.

4. Governor JB Pritzker’s “Comprehensive Employment Plan” (CEP), which, according to the Department of Central Management Services, “sets forth the principles that will govern the State’s hiring and employment policies and procedures for positions at agencies under the jurisdiction of the Governor…" and “applies to current State employees as well as all applicants and candidates for State positions” which states under the definition of “Minimum Qualifications”: “The objectively ascertainable minimum requirements, including education and experience, that an Applicant must possess to be considered for employment in a Position. For positions covered by the Personnel Code, the applicable class specification contains the qualifications to be deemed minimally qualified.”

DCFS employees holding the position of “Children and Family Service Intern” do not have the minimum qualifications on “the applicable class specification” for the position of “Child Protection Specialist” in order “to be deemed minimally qualified.” DCFS employees holding the position of “Children and Family Service Intern” only have the minimum qualifications for the Intern position, a trainee title under CMS rules.

5. DCFS’s own internal documents which state:

“The Department has designated staff persons who act, either full-time or part-time, as Child Protection Specialists, or who function in after-hours positions as Child Protection Specialists. These designated staff are responsible for investigating reports of suspected child abuse or neglect and are the only Department staff permitted to take children into temporary protective custody.” See DCFS Procedures 300 on pg 79 under the heading “Section 300.50 Investigative Process”.

“Within the Department, only Child Protection Specialists (or Permanency Workers serving afterhours as Child Protection Specialists) have authority to take a child into temporary protective custody. The factors for taking temporary protective custody are set out in Rule and Procedures 300.120, Temporary Protective Custody. A child taken into temporary protective custody must be brought before a judicial officer for a shelter care hearing within 48 hours, unless the custody has been terminated earlier, in accordance with the Juvenile Court Act.” See DCFS Procedures 327 on pg 10 under the heading “c) Temporary Protective Custody”.

Families form the foundation of a strong society. Given the power and authority which the public has entrusted to DCFS, DCFS needs to be held to the highest standard of professional excellence, honesty, integrity, and adherence to law. Tragically, DCFS has failed in all four regards.

There must be a line drawn with regard to the federal government’s tolerance for state-level government corruption. And, unlawfully removing children from their parents and committing blatant misrepresentations to do so is absolutely and unquestionably over the line.

We, the undersigned, stand strongly together to call on the U.S. Attorney’s Office in the Northern District of Illinois, regardless of who heads it, or, if necessary, an appointed outside special counsel, to work with the FBI to investigate this matter and aggressively prosecute any individuals found to have violated state and federal laws in initiating and/or operating and/or participating in DCFS’s Intern-as-Investigator program, and do so without political considerations and without compromise.

As the 111 former Assistant U.S. Attorneys’ letter noted the U.S. Attorney’s Office should be “guided by a fundamental principle: Follow the evidence and let the chips fall where they may.”

Espousing this “fundamental principle”, as the former AUSAs called it, without actually applying it is nothing more than mere virtue signaling, which has unfortunately become a standard practice in Illinois politics.

Let the chips fall where they may!