A central Illinois state representative has filed House Bill 5872, which intends to outlaw the production or sale of cultivated meat in the state.
The “Illinois Cultivated Meat Act,” as presented by Rep. Chris Miller, would define cultivated meat, have the state Department of Agriculture oversee the act and would charge violators with a misdemeanor.
In announcing the proposed bill, Miller purported to protect Illinois farmers.
“We don’t need fake meat laboratories creating a highly expensive product that tries to replicate real meat,” he said.
He dismissed environmental claims as “ideology” that is “mind-blowing” and claimed there are opponents to unnamed cultivated meat based on “safety concerns, high costs and overall lack of research.”
