Clean Slate laws aim to automatically or efficiently seal or expunge certain criminal records, removing barriers that can follow people long after they’ve served their sentences. Instead of requiring individuals to navigate costly, complex petitions, these laws make relief automatic for eligible offenses, restoring access to jobs, housing, and education.
The idea is gaining traction nationwide. Over a dozen states have adopted some form of Clean Slate reform, reflecting a bipartisan recognition that perpetual punishment undermines both justice and economic growth.
In 2025, Maryland and Illinois advanced major Clean Slate measures, each shaped by distinct political realities. Maryland paired record-expungement reform with sentencing review and parole changes, targeting systemic racial disparities and long-term incarceration. Illinois revived a previously stalled bill with backing from law enforcement and business leaders, framing automatic sealing as a workforce and economic development tool.
These laws are not only a legal milestone; they are an economic and social equity strategy. By addressing structural barriers to opportunity, they aim to reduce recidivism, expand the labor force, and strengthen communities. Together, Maryland and Illinois offer a glimpse into how targeted legislative action can align justice reform with economic priorities—and why the Clean Slate movement is accelerating.
Illinois’ Clean Slate Act
Illinois’ Senate Bill 1784 would require the automatic sealing of eligible nonviolent criminal convictions twice a year, on January 1 and July 1. Once sealed, records would be inaccessible to the public but remain available to law enforcement and prosecutors.
The bill’s path to the House floor was years in the making. Similar proposals failed in 2021 and 2023, stalling in committee. This year, sponsor Rep. Jehan Gordon-Booth secured support from unlikely allies, including the Illinois Retail Merchants Association, the Illinois Manufacturers Association, and law enforcement groups. Their endorsement reframed Clean Slate as a policy with broad, bipartisan appeal.
Eligibility is limited to certain nonviolent offenses, with explicit exclusions for crimes such as sex offenses against minors, DUI, reckless driving, and other violent crimes requiring sex offender registration. Individuals must have completed their sentence, finished probation, and remained crime-free.
The most significant shift in strategy was messaging. Past campaigns emphasized fairness and second chances.
This time, advocates highlighted workforce shortages and economic losses caused by employment barriers. With Illinois facing one of the highest unemployment rates in the nation, sealing old convictions was pitched as a way to expand the labor pool, reduce recidivism, and drive growth.
Opposition centered on costs. Minority Floor Leader Patrick Windhorst warned the measure could become an unfunded mandate for counties if the state failed to follow through. In response, Gordon-Booth outlined a three-year implementation ramp giving the state time to secure funding and support local circuit clerks. The Illinois State Police would absorb initial costs, with the state pledging to prevent any unfunded burdens.
If enacted, Illinois would become the 13th state with a Clean Slate law, joining a growing national movement that blends justice reform with economic policy.
Maryland’s Expungement Reform Act
Maryland’s Senate Bill 432, the Expungement Reform Act, broadens the list of offenses eligible for expungement and removes a technical barrier that previously disqualified people with parole violations. The change means a single misstep during parole will no longer permanently block someone from clearing their record.
The law adds offenses such as credit card theft, making a false statement to police, and driving without a license to the expungeable list. Advocates expect an immediate effect after the bill takes effect, with people who were ineligible one day able to petition successfully the next.
Gov. Wes Moore framed the reform as dismantling the myth that every sentence should last a lifetime. He emphasized that decades-old offenses should not dictate a person’s ability to work, rent, or secure a loan. The bill’s design is as much about restoring economic opportunity as it is about legal relief.
SB432 passed alongside the Second Look Act, allowing certain long-serving inmates to petition for sentence reductions, and medical and geriatric parole reforms that account for age and illness in release decisions. Together, they form a coordinated effort to expand second chances both inside and outside prison walls.
The reforms are especially significant in a state with one of the nation’s highest incarceration rates for Black residents. By addressing procedural roadblocks and widening eligibility, Maryland is targeting a cycle of exclusion that disproportionately impacts communities of color. The combined measures represent a deliberate policy shift, moving from punitive permanence toward reintegration, equity, and measurable economic benefit.
The Second Look Dimension
The law’s intent is clear: recognize rehabilitation and allow judges to weigh who is fit to reenter society. Petitions are heard by the court that imposed the original sentence, and decisions remain at judicial discretion. Inmates denied relief must wait three years before reapplying and are limited to three total petitions. This structure ensures review without creating automatic release.
By linking sentence review with record-clearing reforms, Maryland created a continuum of second-chance policies, addressing both those still incarcerated and those already living with the consequences of a conviction. The two laws work in tandem to reduce recidivism, ease prison overcrowding, and reconnect individuals to economic and community life.
Illinois’ Clean Slate legislation operates in a narrower space. Its focus is automatic record sealing after sentence completion, with no mechanism for reexamining lengthy prison terms.
While both states aim to dismantle barriers to opportunity, Maryland’s model intervenes earlier, offering relief before release as well as after. The contrast highlights two distinct strategies within the broader criminal justice reform movement: one targeting reintegration from the outside in, and the other starting from inside the prison gates.
Criticism and Political Realities
Opposition to Clean Slate measures in both Illinois and Maryland focused on public safety, cost, and the potential impact on victims. Critics argued that automatic record sealing could obscure relevant information from employers, landlords, or licensing boards, potentially placing vulnerable populations at risk. Some warned that removing certain convictions from public view might diminish accountability or make it harder for victims to feel their experiences remain acknowledged in the justice system.
In Illinois, the debate also centered on administrative costs. Minority Floor Leader Patrick Windhorst cautioned that, without stable funding, the bill could saddle counties with an unfunded mandate.
Maryland’s reforms drew less fiscal criticism, in part because the Expungement Reform Act builds on existing expungement infrastructure rather than creating a new, automated process. By expanding eligible offenses and fixing the parole violation barrier, the law uses current court and administrative systems while streamlining case reviews. Pairing the measure with sentence review and parole reforms also helped frame it as a coordinated investment in efficiency and fairness.
Managing public expectations remains essential. Neither state’s law erases all criminal records, nor do they guarantee employment or housing. Serious and violent offenses remain ineligible, and sealed or expunged records still exist for law enforcement and judicial purposes. The reforms remove structural barriers—steep fees, complex paperwork, outdated eligibility rules—that have kept many qualified people from clearing their records, but they cannot replace employer choice or market conditions.
The path to passage in both states was built on coalitions that crossed partisan and sector lines. In Illinois, business groups and law enforcement leaders joined with faith-based organizations and civil rights advocates, creating a united front that reframed Clean Slate as an economic development policy. In Maryland, legislative leadership, the governor’s office, public defenders, and justice reform groups advanced a package that linked record clearance with sentencing and parole reforms, making it harder for opponents to isolate and defeat any single measure.
These alliances were instrumental in overcoming entrenched skepticism. When supporters can point to benefits for employers, reduced correctional spending, and enhanced public safety through lower recidivism, they blunt arguments that Clean Slate is purely a social justice cause. The broad coalition sends a signal that record-clearing is not a partisan concession, but a practical tool for strengthening the workforce and communities.
At its core, a Clean Slate law is more than a legal mechanism—it’s a statement about who society allows to fully participate after a sentence is served. It forces a choice: continue policies that impose lifelong penalties, or recognize rehabilitation and restore access to opportunity.
Illinois and Maryland took different legislative routes, but both concluded that permanent punishment undermines economic vitality and public safety alike. Their reforms show that, with careful design and broad buy-in, states can balance accountability with reintegration, and in doing so, redefine what justice looks like beyond the prison gate.
